Updated at 4 a.m.
BOSTON/PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island, Dec 18 (Reuters) – The suspect in last weekend’s mass shooting at Brown University is dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, with investigators certain he also killed a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor two days later, officials said on Thursday.
The gunman, identified as Portuguese national Claudio Neves Valente, 48, was found dead Thursday night in a storage rental facility in Salem, New Hampshire, where he had rented a unit last month, officials said.
Valente attended Brown University more than two decades ago as a Ph.D. student in physics and was a former classmate in Portugal of slain MIT professor Nuno Loureiro, 47. Despite those links, authorities said that his motive in the killings remains a mystery.
“I don’t think we have any idea why now, or why Brown, or why these students, why this classroom,” said Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha, at a Thursday night press conference in Providence, where the university is located.
Valente entered a building used for Brown’s engineering and physics programs on December 13 and fired at least 44 rounds from his 9 mm pistol, killing two students and injuring another nine, according to the Providence police affidavit for his arrest.
Then, officials say, he fatally shot Loureiro inside his home before disappearing and leading investigators on a manhunt that stretched over five days. Authorities said two guns — including the 9 mm pistol they believe was used in the killings — were found by his corpse.
In Boston, U.S. Attorney Leah Foley said at a press conference that investigators had evidence that made them certain that Valente, who was living in Miami and was a lawful permanent resident of the United States, murdered Loureiro in his home in Brookline, Massachusetts.
TRUMP ADMINISTRATION TO HALT DIVERSITY VISA PROGRAM
The Trump administration quickly pointed to Valente’s permanent residency status as a reason to halt the Diversity Immigrant Visa program’s lottery system that awards green cards to people from countries with relatively low numbers of immigrants to the United States.
“This heinous individual should never have been allowed in our country,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem posted on X late Thursday.
Noem said she would “immediately” implement a directive by President Donald Trump to pause the green-card lottery “to ensure no more Americans are harmed by this disastrous program.”
Foley said Valente and Loureiro had attended the same academic program at a university in Portugal from 1995 to 2000.
Valente used a phone that was harder to track and did not use credit cards linked to his name, according to Foley.
“He was sophisticated in hiding his tracks,” she said.
Valente also switched the license plates on his rental car in an effort to avoid capture, officials said.
Foley declined to provide many details about the evidence linking Valente to Loureiro’s murder, but said video images showed a rental car Valente was driving near Loureiro’s home. The IP address associated with Valente’s phone was known to have accessed the internet in the vicinity of the slain professor’s home on the day he was killed, Foley added.
Providence police chief Oscar Perez said at a press conference that investigators believe Valente acted alone.
RENTAL CAR BREAKTHROUGH
The big break in the case came via information from a man who had seen Valente inside a bathroom in the Brown University building where he carried out the shooting a few hours later, Perez said.
The witness told police that he found Valente to be extremely suspicious and followed him out of the building and down a street.
The witness saw Valente unlock his rental car and later gave police a description of that vehicle and its license plate, Perez said. Police reviewed video, found the images of Valente’s car, and from there could trace it back to the rental agency, according to officials and the police affidavit.
The rental agency’s security video included Valente’s face and showed him wearing the same clothing worn by the suspect in footage from the Brown University shooting, officials said. Investigators obtained his name from the car rental agreement, and they noted that license plate readers showed Valente had been in the vicinity of the university from December 1 until nearly two weeks later when he carried out the shooting.
Investigators in Providence had said that Valente, whose face was covered by a mask in video from the day of the Brown University shooting, escaped on foot into nearby streets after carrying out the campus killings. That prompted a search that relied heavily on residential security footage because of a lack of surveillance cameras in the classroom building and surrounding area.
Police released images and video of a man believed to be the shooter, based on survivor accounts, and repeatedly sought the public’s help in identifying him. The footage showed the suspect walking in a nearby neighborhood both before and immediately after the attack.
(Reporting by Nate Raymond, Brad Brooks, Svea Herbst-Bayliss, Jana Winter, CJ Gunther, Andrew Hay and Andy Sullivan; Editing by Donna Bryson, David Gregorio, William Mallard and Saad Sayeed)
PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island, Dec 18 (Reuters) – Law enforcement officers have identified a suspect in last weekend’s deadly mass shooting at Brown University, and are investigating a possible link to the murder of a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor two days later near Boston, a person familiar with the matter said.
The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to discuss the matter, did not provide more details on the identification of the suspect or why investigators think the two cases may be linked.
Authorities have been conducting a manhunt since the December 13 shooting inside a classroom building at Brown University shook Rhode Island’s capital city of Providence. Two students were killed and at least eight were wounded.
Two days later, MIT professor Nuno Loureiro, 47, was fatally shot in his home in Brookline, Massachusetts on Monday evening. Brookline is 49 miles north of Brown’s campus.
Earlier this week, an FBI official said authorities did not believe there was a link between Saturday’s shooting at Brown and the MIT professor’s murder. Loureiro was a member of the departments of nuclear science and engineering and physics as well as MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center.
SEEKING THE PUBLIC’S HELP
Investigators in Providence said the suspect in the Brown University shooting escaped on foot into nearby streets, prompting a search that relied heavily on residential security footage because of a lack of surveillance cameras in the classroom building and surrounding area.
Police released images and video of a masked man believed to be the shooter, based on survivor accounts, and have repeatedly asked for the public’s help in identifying that man. The footage showed the suspect walking in a nearby neighborhood both before and immediately after the attack, including moments when police vehicles arrived with flashing lights.
“He could be anywhere,” Providence Police Chief Oscar Perez said on Wednesday, adding that authorities did not initially know the suspect’s identity or motive.
Providence Mayor Brett Smiley said residents and students had grown “restless and eager” for an arrest as the search stretched into several days.
Police also circulated photos of another unidentified man seen near the area, saying they wanted to speak with him as a potential witness who may have relevant information.
Authorities initially announced a person was in custody a day after the shooting, but later released that individual after determining he was not involved.
(Reporting by Nate Raymond and Brad Brooks; additional reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss in Providence; editing by Donna Bryson and David Gregorio)
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