The suspect in the fatal shooting at Brown University in the US has been found dead.
Two students, Mukhammad Aziz Umurzokov and Ella Cook, were killed and nine were injured during the shooting inside a classroom building at the Ivy League university in Providence, Rhode Island, on Saturday.
Speaking at a news conference on Thursday in Providence, police said the suspect had been found dead.
He is a 48-year-old Portuguese man called Claudio Manuel Neves Valente whose last known address was in Miami, Florida, police chief Oscar Perez said.
US attorney for the district of Massachusetts Leah Foley, has also named Neves Valente, as the murderer of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) professor Nuno Loureiro.
The 47 year-old academic had been found dead with gunshot wounds on Monday evening, in Brookline, Massachusetts – a town 50 miles north of Boston.
Neves Valente attended the same academic programme as Mr Loureiro at a university in Lisbon, Portugal, between 1995 and 2000, according to Ms Foley. He also used to be a PhD student in physics at Brown University, according to the institution’s president.
Neves Valente received a green card under the diversity lottery immigrant visa programme (DV1) in 2017, which Mr Trump halted with immediate effect on Friday.
He was found dead in a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire, seemingly from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
“He may have been dead for a bit of time,” a senior official said.
Rhode Island’s attorney general Peter Neronha said the suspect was found “with a satchel, with two firearms and evidence in the car that matches exactly what we see at the scene here in Providence”.
Reddit post blew case wide open
Neves Valente was found after officers received a tip pointing them to a witness account posted on the social media platform Reddit.
On Wednesday, police released a picture of a “person of interest” they wanted to speak to as part of the investigation – this person was behind the Reddit post and had encountered Neves Valente less than two hours before the shooting.
“We had that picture of that second individual, and within an hour, no more than two, that person came forward to two Providence police officers. He blew this case right open,” Mr Neronha said.
There are still “a lot of unknowns” regarding the motive for the Brown University shooting, Mr Neronha said, adding: “We don’t know why now, why Brown, why these students and why this classroom.”
Neves Valente was a PhD student in physics at Brown from 2000 until the spring of 2001, when he took a leave of absence before formally withdrawing effective July 2003, according to Brown University president Christina Paxson.
She said that as a physics student, Neves Valente would have spent “a great deal of time” in the Barus and Holley building, where the shooting took place, for classes.
Visa scheme that granted the murderer entry to US is suspended
Neves Valente entered the US after being issued a diversity lottery immigrant visa (DV1) in 2017 and was granted a green card.
On his visa, he listed Brown University as the name of his institution and the Barus and Holley building, where the physics department is located, as the address of the institution.
Neves Valente also listed “None-Dropout” as his degree or diploma, and dates of attendance from 1 September 2001 to 1 May 2001.
After Neves Valente’s identity and visa status were revealed, the Trump administration immediately paused the DV1 programme, according to secretary of homeland security Kristi Noem.
“In 2017, President Trump fought to end this program, following the devastating NYC truck ramming by an ISIS terrorist, who entered under the DV1 program, and murdered eight people,” Ms Noem wrote on X.
At President Trump’s direction, I am immediately directing USCIS to pause the DV1 program to ensure no more Americans are harmed by this disastrous program.”
