Autopsy confirms Brown University, MIT shooting suspect died by suicide days before body found

An autopsy performed by the New Hampshire Department of Justice Office of the Chief Medical Examiner confirmed that 48-year-old Claudio Manuel Neves Valente died from a gunshot wound to the head and that the manner of death was suicide, authorities announced Friday. Investigators said he died on Tuesday, Dec. 16, and his body was found two days later in a storage unit in Salem, New Hampshire. Neves Valente was identified by Providence police as the suspect in the Dec. 13 Brown University shooting and the Dec. 15 fatal shooting of MIT nuclear science professor Nuno Loureiro.

Brown University officials disclosed that Neves Valente was a Portuguese national who studied physics at Brown from fall 2000 through spring 2001 and withdrew from the program in 2003. He had no current affiliation with the university at the time of the Dec. 13 attack, according to Brown President Christina Paxson. The attack on the Rhode Island campus left two students dead — Ella Cook of Alabama and Mukhammad Aziz Umurzokov of Virginia — and nine others wounded in the Barus & Holley Engineering Building.

Federal authorities recovered two 9 mm pistols in New Hampshire near Neves Valente's body, and the cases were matched to the two killings by the ATF and FBI in collaboration with the Connecticut State Police forensic laboratory. Investigators canvassed neighborhood surveillance video, released images of a person of interest, and briefly questioned another man before identifying Neves Valente as the suspect. One gun was linked to the Brown shooting and the other to Loureiro's killing.

Brown University President Christina Paxson described Neves Valente as a former Brown physics student who studied at the university in the early 2000s and had no current affiliation with the campus at the time of the attacks. The two incidents prompted a broad security response and a prolonged investigation by federal and local authorities.

Authorities have said Neves Valente acted alone in both shootings. Investigators are examining his movements in the days leading up to the attacks, including tracing credit card transactions, and FBI agents have been in Florida, where he reportedly last lived. There have been no publicly released writings or documents indicating a clear motive. New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella and other officials reiterated that the investigation remains ongoing as authorities pursue new information and interviews to build a fuller timeline of events.

The case remains under review as authorities seek a motive and a fuller picture of his actions.