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(NEW YORK) — New details about how police caught up to Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, the 48-year-old former Brown University graduate student who allegedly perpetrated a mass shooting at Brown and killed a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor, have emerged after a dayslong manhunt where officials said he made a series of moves designed to evade authorities.

Authorities credited the work of a tipster who they say “blew this case out in the open.”

Providence Police Chief Oscar Perez said local police helped track down Neves Valente, who was found dead in a New Hampshire storage unit on Thursday, in part thanks to surveillance video and a tip from an anonymous source that pointed authorities to a post on social media platform Reddit.

The tip referenced a post in which the Reddit user — later identified as John — called for police to “look into a grey Nissan with Florida plates,” according to the affidavit.

“I’m being dead serious,” the Reddit post read. “That was the car he was driving.”

After noticing the man they believed to be John interacting with the suspect on surveillance footage, police released images of him and asked for help in identifying him on Wednesday. Later that day, John approached a Providence police officer and said he was the person they were looking for.

John told detectives that he encountered the suspect in the bathroom of Brown University’s Barus & Holley building in the hours before Dec. 13 shooting and was suspicious, according to the affidavit.

John followed Neves Valente outside, where he said he observed the suspect approaching his car, the affidavit noted. The suspect and John would lock eyes as Neves Valente repeatedly walked around the block, in what John would describe “as a game of cat and mouse,” according to the affidavit.

“At some point they [John and Neves Valente] encountered each other on George Street, at which time, the Suspect ran in the opposite direction. John then ran up behind the person of interest, slowed to a good speed-walk and walked past the Suspect,” the affidavit said.

Ultimately, John questioned Neves Valente why he was circling the block prompting a response from the suspect, before John walked away, according to the affidavit.

Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha told reporters John’s information was crucial in tracking the suspect.

“I remember last night watching his interview, and he blew this case right open,” he said.

The tip and surveillance video, along with the use of license-plate reader technology, led investigators to a car rental agency in Massachusetts.

There, police obtained a copy of the rental agreement with the suspect’s name, as well as video of the suspect that matched the videos of the person of interest seen on the Brown University campus on the day of the shooting, the complaint said.

That discovery ultimately led investigators to a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire, where the suspect was found dead, officials said.

Financial records and video evidence confirmed that the storage unit belonged to the alleged suspect and that the rental vehicle was connected to both the Rhode Island and Massachusetts cases.

Authorities identified the suspect as Neves Valente, a Portuguese national and former Brown University student whose last known address was in Miami, Florida. Officials said Neves Valente died by suicide Thursday evening.

Officials confirmed that Neves Valente was found with a satchel containing two firearms, and evidence recovered from the vehicle matched what was found at the Providence crime scene.

Federal authorities confirmed that shortly before 9 p.m. on Thursday, FBI SWAT teams executed court-authorized search warrants at a storage facility in Salem, which is where they found Neves Valente’s body.

The autopsy performed by the New Hampshire Department of Justice Office of the Chief Medical Examiner estimated that Neves Valente died on Tuesday, one day after the professor was killed at MIT, according to investigators.

Portugal’s Instituto Superior Técnico (IST) confirmed to ABC News that Cláudio Manuel Neves Neves Valente studied between 1995 and 2000 in the school’s physics engineering program, the same one attended at the time by slain MIT professor Nuno F.G. Loureiro.

A 1998 announcement in Portugal’s official Diario da República referred to Neves Valente’s appointment as a teaching assistant at IST and a 2000 notice in the same publication mentions his termination from the role.

A spokesperson for IST declined to comment further on Neves Valente’s history at the institution, due to the ongoing investigation and out of respect for the friends and family of Loureiro.

Brown officials confirmed that Neves Valente was enrolled at the university from the fall of 2000 through the spring of 2001 as a graduate student in physics, entering Brown’s graduate program in September 2000 before taking a leave of absence in April 2001 and formally withdrawing in 2003.

“He was not a current student, was not an employee and did not receive a degree from the University, attending for only three semesters as a graduate student until taking a leave in 2001 and formally withdrawing effective July 31, 2003,” Brown University President Christina Paxson wrote in a letter to students and faculty Thursday.

During his time at Brown, he was enrolled only in physics courses, which were typically held in the Barus & Holley building. University records indicate he has had no active affiliation with Brown for more than two decades.

Police said the suspect acted alone and that there is no indication, at this time, of additional planned attacks. Investigators have not identified any writings, known criminal history or clear motive.

Officials said forensic teams are still processing evidence recovered in New Hampshire, including firearms, and will compare it with ballistic and DNA evidence from the Providence crime scene.

Paxson said the university is still reviewing how the suspect gained access to the building. She said the building was unlocked that day because exams were being held, and the university will examine security procedures moving forward.

Investigators said Neves Valente obtained lawful permanency in April 2017 and was issued a green card.

Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said in an X post that Neves Valente received his visa through the diversity visa lottery program, and announced that, at President Donald Trump’s direction, she was pausing the program.

Each year, the State Department awards up to 50,000 immigrant visas to “winners” of the diversity visa lottery. The program was created by Congress in 1990 to allow applicants from countries with low rates of immigration into the U.S. to come here.

The winners are selected at random, but they must still go through a lengthy application process, which includes submitting criminal records, being interviewed at an embassy or consulate, and meeting other requirements, such as having a High School Diploma or two years of work experience. Applicants are then allowed to apply for lawful permanent resident status.

Investigators said they identified Neves Valente by name late Wednesday night and weighed whether releasing his identity could cause him to flee or take further action.

Officials said they believed he might return the rental car in Boston or attempt to leave the area, and they wanted the opportunity to arrest him without alerting him that police were closing in.

Officials said it remains unclear exactly when the suspect took his own life, but noted that he signed into the storage facility but was never seen leaving.

The site was secured by federal agents, and investigators said an autopsy will help determine the timing of his death.

ABC News’ Armando Garcia and Christopher Looft contributed to this report.

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(BOSTON, Mass.) — It was Thursday morning when investigators definitively determined the same individual opened fire on a study group at Brown University and, two days later, murdered an MIT professor — raising fears among law enforcement officials that the killer may have had other intended targets, according to the top federal law enforcement official in Boston.

“We had no idea if he had a hit list and these were just the first two stops on his tour,” Leah Foley, the United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts, told ABC News on Friday.

Foley said that the suspect, Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, was found dead in the New Hampshire storage unit with two 9mm Glock firearms equipped with green laser sights, five magazines with nearly 200 rounds of ammunition and nearly $900 in cash. In his car, investigators said they found more ammunition and body armor.

“This was highly premeditated and he was definitely equipped for the mission that he sought out to do,” Foley said.

Neves Valente, 48, died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, police said.

On Friday, an autopsy was underway to determine how long the suspect had been dead by the time his body was found. Ballistics tests and DNA tests were underway.

Investigators were also searching through the contents of three USB thumb drives found in the suspect’s car to see if they contained clues about a motive. It is unclear at this time if the suspect had any other potential targets, according to people familiar with the investigation.

Foley said investigators believe Brown University and the MIT professor — Nuno F.G. Loureiro — were intentional targets, but they do not know why.

“I don’t know that even if he had explained why, that that would be an answer that is satisfactory to anyone,” Foley said. “He was evil.”

The possibility that the killer could have struck again infused the manhunt with new urgency. Federal agents fanned out across four New England states and posted up at airports in Boston and Hartford.

“We had no idea if he was going to act again in New England or try to leave New England,” Foley said.

Neves Valente had already switched license plates once, according to authorities. In the car, investigators said they found another expired plate.

The suspect was a former Brown graduate student who attended the school some 25 years ago, school officials said. He had enrolled as a Ph.D student in Brown’s physics program in 2000 and attended for less than a year, before going on a leave of absence and then withdrawing.

Neves Valente and Loureiro were both Portuguese nationals and had attended the same physics engineering program at Instituto Superior Técnico in Lisbon, the school confirmed to ABC News.

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(WASHINGTON) — After years of legal battles and online speculation, the Justice Department on Friday is set to release what a top DOJ official says are “several hundred thousand” documents from the investigations into the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, whose connection to the rich and powerful and 2019 death by suicide has generated scores of conspiracy theories.

The DOJ faces a Friday deadline for the release of all remaining Epstein files after Congress last month passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act following the blowback the administration received seeking the release of the materials.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, in an interview Friday morning on Fox and Friends, said, “I expect that we’re going to release several hundred thousand documents today … and then over the next couple of weeks I expect several hundred thousand more.”  

Several Democratic lawmakers, responding in the afternoon to Blanche’s comments, objected to only a partial release of the files Friday.

Blanche, in his Fox appearance, said, “The most important thing that the attorney general has talked about, that [FBI] Director [Kash] Patel has talked about, is that we protect victims, and so what we’re doing is we are looking at every single piece of paper that we are going to produce, making sure that every victim, their name, their identity, their story, to the extent it needs to be protected, is completely protected.”

The Epstein Files Act says the Justice Department “may withhold or redact” the identities of Epstein’s victims, and contains exemptions that would allow the DOJ to withhold records that “would jeopardize an active federal investigation or ongoing prosecution.”

Blanche said “there’s a lot of eyes” looking over the documents to ensure victim identities have been redacted. The Justice Department in recent weeks has enlisted scores of attorneys from the National Security Division to conduct the review, according to sources familiar with the matter.

“Those documents will come in all different forms, photographs and other materials associated with all of the investigations into Mr. Epstein,” Blanche said.

He further suggested in the interview that the administration’s review has been partially hamstrung by a ruling from a judge in the Southern District of New York that demanded the administration verify that its review is fully protecting the identities of victims.

When asked whether the American public should expect any additional criminal cases to come in the wake of the release of the files, Blanche said, “Look, as the president directed, it’s still being investigated, and I expect that will continue to happen. So we, as of today, there’s no new charges coming but, but we are investigating.”

President Donald Trump recently directed the Justice Department to investigate high-profile Democrats associated with Epstein, a task that Attorney General Pam Bondi then referred to the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.  

The Justice Department and FBI announced in July that they would be releasing no additional Epstein files, after several top officials — including Patel and outgoing FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino — had, prior to joining the administration, accused the government of shielding information regarding the Epstein case.

The Senate subsequently voted to approved the Epstein transparency bill passed by the House, after which President Donald Trump signed it into law.

Critics of Trump have speculated about the degree to which the president, who had a friendship with Epstein until they had a falling out around 2004, appears in the Epstein files, while Trump has accused several well-known Democrats of having ties to the disgraced financier.

“Perhaps the truth about these Democrats, and their associations with Jeffrey Epstein, will soon be revealed, because I HAVE JUST SIGNED THE BILL TO RELEASE THE EPSTEIN FILES!” Trump wrote on social media after signing the bill.

Epstein owned two private islands in the Virgin Islands and large properties in New York City, New Mexico and Palm Beach, Florida, where he came under investigation for allegedly luring minor girls to his seaside home for massages that turned sexual. He served 13 months of an 18-month sentence for sex crimes charges after reaching a controversial non-prosecution agreement with the U.S. attorney’s office in Miami.

In 2019, prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York indicted Epstein on charges that he “sexually exploited and abused dozens of minor girls at his homes in Manhattan, New York, and Palm Beach, Florida, among other locations,” using cash payments to recruit a “vast network of underage victims,” some of whom were as young as 14 years old.

Epstein died by suicide in a New York jail in 2019 while awaiting trial.

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(NEW YORK) — Two elite Northeast institutions of higher education have been rocked by horrific acts of gun violence, just days apart.

In the first incident, two people were killed and nine were injured in a mass shooting at Brown University, when a gunman opened fire on the Rhode Island campus, officials said.

Two days later, some 50 miles away in neighboring Massachusetts, an esteemed professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was killed in a shooting at his home, officials said.

Following a dayslong manhunt, authorities identified the suspect in both shootings as Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, a 48-year-old former Brown graduate student, who attended the school some 25 years ago. Valente, a Portuguese national, and the slain MIT professor both attended the same physics engineering program at Instituto Superior Técnico in Lisbon, the school confirmed to ABC News.

Officials have not yet provided a motive for the back-to-back shootings that left residents of parts of New England on edge for days.

Here’s how the tragic shootings unfolded.

Nov. 26-Nov. 30

Valente, who is believed to have lived in Florida, rents a hotel room in Boston, according to federal officials.

Dec. 1

Valente rents a gray Nissan Sentra with Florida plates from a car rental agency in Boston and then drives to the vicinity of Brown University in Providence, where the vehicle is seen “intermittently” through Dec. 12, according to federal officials.

Dec. 13

A person of interest in the Brown shooting — subsequently believed to be the suspect, Valente — is seen in surveillance footage walking through a residential neighborhood near the campus, beginning around 2 p.m., in images and footage released by the FBI. But police have said they believe he had been around the Brown campus as early as 10 a.m. that day “casing out the area.” The individual is seen dressed from head to toe in dark clothing, including wearing a surgical mask over his face.

Around 2:16 p.m., an unknown person — later identified as a man who introduced himself as John — is seen interacting with the person of interest, according to the arrest warrant affidavit for Valente.

The shooting at Brown occurs at 4:03 p.m. in a lecture hall in the school’s Barus & Holley Engineering building during a final exam review, according to authorities and school officials.

Just after the shooting, a security video captures the person of interest emerging onto Hope Street from what investigators described as “lot 42” on the Brown campus.

The last video in the FBI’s timeline shows the individual walking north on Hope Street at 4:07 p.m.

Valente returns to Massachusetts over the next day, where at some point he switches the plates on his rental car to an unregistered plate out of Maine, according to federal officials.

Dec. 14

A man initially thought to be a person of interest in the Brown shooting is detained at about 3:45 a.m. at a Hampton Inn in Coventry, Providence, according to law enforcement sources and police, though that individual is released hours later without being charged.

Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha says during a late-night press conference that there had been evidence pointing to this individual, but that evidence “now points in a different direction.”

Dec. 15

Authorities release new images and video of the person of interest in the mass shooting at Brown and the FBI announces it is offering a reward of up to $50,000 for information leading to the identification, arrest and conviction of the individual responsible.

That night, authorities respond to a residence in Brookline, Massachusetts, after receiving a report of a man shot at his home, according to the Norfolk County District Attorney’s Office.

The victim is identified by the office as 47-year-old Nuno Loureiro, a Portugal native who is a faculty member in MIT’s departments of Nuclear Science & Engineering and Physics and the director of MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center.

Video surveillance captured Valente in the area of the professor’s apartment that evening, according to federal officials.

Following the shooting, Valente drives to a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire, which he had rented in November, according to federal officials.

Dec. 16

Loureiro is pronounced dead at an area hospital in the morning, according to the Norfolk District Attorney’s Office.

Authorities release a new image and enhanced video of the person of interest sought in the Brown shooting.

Police received an anonymous tip in the investigation into the Brown shooting referencing a Reddit post in which the poster — later identified as John — called for police to “look into a grey Nissan with Florida plates,” according to the affidavit.

Dec. 17

A Brown University faculty member reports to state police seeing a suspicious vehicle in the area of the campus the morning of Dec. 11, describing it as a gray sedan with Florida plates, according to the affidavit.

Providence police announce they are seeking the public’s help in identifying and speaking to the unknown individual — later identified as John — “who was in proximity of the person of interest” in the Brown shooting.

John approaches Providence police officers at Brown University to report his interaction with the person of interest, according to the affidavit. He tells detectives that he saw the man approach a gray or silver sedan with a Florida license plate the afternoon of Dec. 13 at a location near Brown’s campus, according to the affidavit.

“John informed detectives that he recognized one of the images released to the press as the person he encountered that day, which prompted him to post on Reddit,” the affidavit states.

Detectives trace the vehicle to the one rented by Valente in Boston, according to the affidavit.

Dec. 18

A Rhode Island state court issues a state arrest warrant for Valente, charging him with two counts of murder and 23 felony counts of assault and felony firearms offenses in the Brown shooting.

While executing search warrants on the Salem storage unit facility shortly before 9 p.m., Valente is found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound inside a storage unit, authorities said.

During a late-night news conference, authorities identify the suspect in the Brown mass shooting as Valente and confirm he is believed to be the same man who gunned down Loureiro, saying the professor was the intended target.

Officials say investigators linked the Brown and MIT shootings through the vehicle, financial records and video footage.

ABC News’ Josh Margolin, Aaron Katersky, Jon Haworth and Bill Hutchinson contributed to this report.

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