Brown University shooter planned attack for years, DOJ

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Newly released evidence shows the man accused of the deadly shooting at Brown University and the killing of a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor days later had been planning the violence for months, according to prosecutors.

The suspect, Portuguese national Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, 48, recorded several short videos after the shootings. Those recordings were later recovered from a storage unit in Salem, New Hampshire, where Valente was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound on December 18.

In transcripts released by federal prosecutors, Valente spoke about planning the attack over multiple academic semesters and showed no remorse. Officials said the videos did not reveal a clear motive.

Authorities say Valente opened fire inside a Brown University auditorium on December 13, killing Ella Cook 19, and Mukhammad Aziz Umurzokov, 18, and wounding nine other students. Two days later, investigators say he fatally shot MIT professor Nuno Loureiro at the professor’s home near Boston.

Valente previously attended Brown University in the early 2000s as a Ph.D. physics student before withdrawing, officials said. Authorities also confirmed he and Professor Loureiro had attended the same university in Portugal years earlier.

Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha credited a crucial tip that helped investigators identify and track Valente. Officials said the information came from an unhoused individual who had been living in the basement of Brown’s engineering building and encountered the suspect shortly before the attack.