Suspect in death of MIT professor was a former classmate, prosecutors say

Claudio Manuel Neves Valente had attended the same academic program in Portugal as Nuno F.G. Loureiro, the MIT professor, from 1995 to 2000. Loureiro, 47, graduated with a degree in physics from the Instituto Superior Técnico in 2000, according to his MIT profile.

Neves Valente, 48, entered the United States on a student visa in 2000, enrolling briefly in a graduate physics program at Brown University until the spring of 2001, according to the university. The U.S. attorney in Massachusetts, Leah Foley, said Neves Valente became a permanent resident in 2017, with his residence registered in Florida.

In Portugal, Loureiro worked as a researcher at the institute until 2016, when he came to the United States to join MIT as a professor of nuclear science and engineering, according to his profile. In 2024, he was appointed the director of MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center, one of the school’s largest labs.

On Dec. 1, Neves Valente rented a Nissan Sentra sedan from an Alamo rental agency in Boston and drove to Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, according to an affidavit filed by Providence police. License plate readers captured the car in Brown’s vicinity in the days leading up to the campus shooting, according to the affidavit.

As he traveled across states, Neves Valente took pains to conceal his identity and movements, including changing the rental car’s Florida license plate to an unregistered plate from Maine and using a phone that disguised his location, Foley said.

“He was sophisticated in hiding his tracks,” she said.

The car was seen around the Brown campus until Dec. 12, the day before Neves Valente allegedly opened fire on an auditorium full of students reviewing for final exams. Two students were killed and nine others were injured in that shooting last Saturday.

Three days later, on Tuesday, Loureiro was found with gunshot wounds by his neighbor at his home in Brookline, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston near the MIT campus. He was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Security footage showed Neves Valente within a half mile of Loureiro’s residence, authorities said.

Foley said Neves Valente drove to Salem, New Hampshire, and entered a storage facility within hours of shooting Loureiro. He was seen in security footage entering a storage unit, wearing the same clothes he had worn in Brookline.

Police found Neves Valente dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound in a storage unit Thursday. It was unclear when he had died.

With his death, authorities said that both cases in Providence and Brookline were closed. “He is the person responsible not only for the Brown shootings, but for the Brookline shooting,” Foley said in a news briefing Thursday evening.

“We hope that this outcome tonight brings an increased sense of safety for our community,” said Christina Paxson, the president of Brown University.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.