PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Boston’s FBI Field Office and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts announced today that they have concluded a significant portion of the investigation into the mass shooting at Brown University and the killing of MIT Professor Nuno Loureiro.
Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, a Portuguese national and legal permanent resident, was found to be responsible for the mass shooting and the murder of Loureiro back on December 13 and 15 of 2025.
Two students were killed, Ella Cook and MukhammadAziz Umurzokov, and nine others were injured during the mass shooting at Brown.
Professor Nuno Loureiro was shot dead in his foyer on the night of December 15.
Neves Valente would later be found dead in a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire due to a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
The FBI said they have worked closely with its law enforcement partners for months across the country and around the world on a “coordinated and comprehensive investigation” to find a motive for the shootings.
The FBI recovered more than 112 pieces of evidence, ran down more than 490 leads, combed through 11,000 plus files of surveillance footage, analyzed 815 videos, and 1,327 audio files found on the shooter’s electronic devices. They also conducted more than 260 interviews throughout their investigation.
Claudio Manuel Neves Valente was living in Miami, Florida at the time of the shootings, and acted alone in the mass shooting and murder of Dr. Nuno Loureiro, according to the FBI. His actions also had no nexus to terrorism.
Neves Valente was born in Torres Novas, Santarem, Portugal and was 48 years old at the time of the shooting and his subsequent death.
Background
In looking into his background, Neves Valente arrived in the United States in August of 2000 a student visa at Brown University after completing a physics program at Instituto Superior Tecnico in Portugal.
That fall, Neves Valente enrolled in a doctoral program at Brown University but subsequently withdrew after a year, shortly leaving the United States and going back to Portugal.
17 years later, Neves Valente obtained lawful permanent residency while living in Miami, Florida, and briefly worked as a rideshare driver.
At the time of the shootings, Neves Valente was unemployed and had no criminal record or prior documented contacts with law enforcement.
Evidence
Two firearms, identified by law enforcement as 9mm pistols, were recovered in Salem, New Hampshire with the body of Neves Valente. They were discovered to be purchased by him at a pawn shop in Florida.
The firearm, a Glock 34 9mm, used in the Brown University shooting, was purchased back in July of 2020. The second firearm used in the shooting and murder of Loureiro was a Glock 26 9mm, purchased in March of 2022.
After the shooting at Brown University and the murder of Nuno Loureiro, Neves Valente made a series of audio files and short videos in which he confessed to committing these crimes, “showed no remorse, and provided no reason for his actions,” the FBI said.
In the audio recordings, Neves Valente stated he began planning the attack at Brown University in 2022 which is when he acquired the storage unit in Salem, New Hampshire, and transported his firearms to that location.
Motive
The FBI began the steps into looking for a motive and reason why Neves Valente decided to commit these shootings.
Based on analysis of the information and evidence, the FBI determined that Valente’s victims were “symbolic in nature.”
“The university as a whole and Loureiro represented to the shooter his personal failures and injustices he perceived were inflicted by others over time,” the FBI said in a statement.
“By attacking them, Neves Valente was likely able to overcome his shame and envy by using violence to punish those communities that he perceived contributed to his downfall.”
The FBI determined that Neves Valente was “committed” to conducting the attack and had completed his planning for years.
Neves Valente considered, planned, and prepared for the mass shooting at Brown University in increments over a period of several years “in isolation, spanning multiple geographic locations.”
The FBI said Neves Valente’s transient lifestyle, long-term planning, and social isolation provided little to no opportunity for anyone around him to understand his behaviors.
Neves Valente did not have traditional support, such as family, peers, and authority figures, who would have been able to observe any potential warning signs and contact law enforcement.
The FBI said that Neves Valente was also driven by his grievances that he collected throughout his life.
“He appeared to struggle with how he viewed his life achievements and felt he was considerably marginalized by others,” the FBI said.
“The shooter’s inflated sense of self contributed to interpersonal conflicts in his life and led him to believe he was being treated unjustly, preventing him from reaching his perceived full potential.”
The FBI said that they believe Neves Valente experienced a failure to “thrive, long-standing suicidality, and his current situation was incongruent to where he felt he should be at this stage in his life.”
The FBI said Neves Valente’s failures outweighed his successes, his paranoia increased, compounding his continued inability to thrive, leading to him being “mentally unwell and committed to dying.”
The case is still under investigation, however, the FBI stressed they believe that there is no ongoing threat to the public at this time.
Three students at Brown University have since filed lawsuits against the school claiming negligence as a janitor allegedly claim to see Neves Valente several times on campus.
The FBI indicates that mental health stressors alone could not fully explain why he did what he did.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates as more information becomes available.
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