Brown University shooting suspect found dead, officials say
Police on scene at the Extra Space Storage facility where the Brown University shooting suspect was found dead on Thursday.
By Taylor Romine, Emma Tucker, John Miller, Holmes Lybrand, Tori B. Powell and CNN staff
PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island (CNN) — The suspect in the Brown University shooting has been found dead after taking his own life, authorities said Thursday night.
The deceased suspect was identified as Claudio Valente, a 48-year-old former Brown University student and Portuguese national, Providence Police Chief Oscar L. Perez, Jr. said during a news conference. Valente was found dead in a storage facility with a satchel, two firearms, and evidence matching the scene of the crime.
The investigation relied on “threads” of information to get officials answers on the shooter’s whereabouts, according to Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha.
A person who came to local police officers with information, Neronha said, “blew this case right open.”
“That person led us to the car, which led us to the name, which led us to the photographs of that individual renting the car, which matched the clothing of our shooter here in Providence that matched the satchel that we see here in Providence,” Neronha said.
Earlier, police swarmed the Salem, New Hampshire, area where they found an abandoned car with a license plate believed to be connected to the suspect.
Authorities are also looking into potential ties between the Brown shooting and this week’s killing of an MIT professor at his Massachusetts home, according to a law enforcement official close to the case, though the official stressed there’s not yet definitive evidence of a connection. When authorities involved in the manhunt for Valente saw a call-out from police investigating the killing of an MIT professor, they realized a vehicle of interest in that case was just like one they were looking for.
It was the same kind of car used by suspects in both cases, but the license plates were different, according to a law enforcement official briefed on the case. A witness had provided a license plate to authorities probing the Brown University shooting who then investigated the car and its past drivers, which allowed them to identify the same vehicle of interest in the MIT professor killing.
The shooting on Saturday left two students dead and nine injured at the Ivy League school. At least 75 school shootings have unfolded this year in the US.
The “unthinkable” happened to the Brown University community in Providence and recovering from the devastating mass shooting will take “a great deal of time,” said Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee.
“We’re going to be forever changed but our commitment on the state level is to continue to support Providence, Brown and the people in the state of Rhode Island in recovery,” said McKee at the news conference.
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