Person of interest found dead in Brown University shooting

A person of interest in the Brown University mass shooting was found dead Thursday night with a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to two law enforcement officials with direct knowledge of the incident.

At a news conference, Providence, Rhode Island Police Chief Oscar Perez identified the person of interest as Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, 48, a former Brown physics student and Portuguese national who was found dead in a Salem, N.H., storage locker.

“As far as we know, he acted alone,” Perez said.

Authorities believe that Valente later committed the fatal shooting of MIT professor Nuno Loureiro in Brookline, Massachusetts, on Tuesday. They said they are unaware of any motive for Valente’s actions, but added that Valente and Loureiro attended the same academic program between 1995 and 2000.

Leah Foley, the U.S. attorney for the District of Massachusetts, said that law enforcement authorities were able to track Valente’s journey from where he appeared to live in Florida to Boston, where he reserved a hotel room at the start of December. After renting a Nissan sedan with Florida plates — which ultimately led to investigators locating and identifying him — Valente drove to Providence and after the Brown shooting, back to Massachusetts and ultimately to the storage facility, where he was found dead.

Valente attended Brown for a short time from fall 2000 to spring 2001, according to an affadavit filed by the Rhode Island police, and was a Ph.D student in physics. Foley said he was in the United States at one time on an F-1 visa for international students, and later obtained permanent residency.

The manhunt to find him endured for five days and included some false starts and twists and turns. It was ultimately a bystander and Reddit poster identified as “John” in the police affadavit who led law enforcement officials to a rental car and a name.

Providence police chief Perez described a massive operation by federal and local authorities who scoured video footage and identified a person of interest who is the “same individual that has been the focus of this investigation since the beginning.” Perez said “critical evidence” was collected by the public and that authorities identified a vehicle in video footage that corresponded to a separate tip.

That tip led to a Massachusetts car rental facility, where authorities obtained video of the person of interest and the copy of the rental agreement, which apparently revealed Valente’s name.

The affadavit from Providence police detective Ryan Fedo lays out how the case was cracked after a tipster, identified in the affadavit as “John,” approached Providence police on Dec. 17 after recognizing the person of interest in video footage released to the public.

“John” informed the police of his Dec. 13 interactions with the person of interest in the bathroom of the Barus Holley building at Brown where the shooting occurred, one day beforehand. “John” told the police the person of interest was wearing “inappropriate” clothing described as “inadequate” for the weather and described a mask covering half his face.

Afterwards, “John” again encountered the person of interest near the Rhode Island Historic society close to a Nissan sedan with Florida license plates. He described what he viewed as strange behavior by the person, at first seeming to use a key fob to open the car and then backing away from the car in what “John” described as “game of cat and mouse.” At one point, the two exchanged words with the person of interest asking “John:” “Why are you harassing me?” the affadavit stated. “John” posted about his encounters to Reddit, saying police should look at the man he encountered.

A similar Nissan was recognized driving in the area by a Brown faculty member on Dec. 17, leading to police identifying its license plate. Authorities tracked it to an Alamo Rent a Car in downtown Boston, leading to the identification of Valente.

The news came five days after the shooter who opened fire in a Brown classroom during finals week escaped onto the streets of Providence, launching a full-scale search that involved local law enforcement and officers from nine state and federal agencies.

The shooting took place inside a first-floor classroom in Barus & Holley, an engineering and physics building, on Saturday afternoon during final exams.

In the days following the campus shooting, officials released a series of photos and videos of who they said was a person of interest in the case. In the images, the person is dressed in all black and wearing a black medical mask and beanie. The FBI offered a $50,000 reward for any information that could help lead them to identify and arrest a suspect.

On Wednesday Providence police released a series of images of an individual they were seeking for questioning who was “in proximity” to the person of interest in the case, a spokesperson for the police department said. 

All of the victims of the shooting were students at the university, according to Brown President Christina Paxson. Ella Cook, 19, of Mountain Brook, Alabama, and MukhammadAziz Umurzokov, 18, of Midlothian, Virginia, were killed.

Nine others were hospitalized for gunshot wounds. Three have since been discharged, according to Providence Mayor Brett Smiley. He said that of the six still hospitalized, one remained in critical but stable condition and five were in stable condition.