Police are investigating link between Brown shooting and killing of MIT professor, AP sources say
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — Authorities said Thursday they are investigating a connection between last week’s mass shooting at Brown University and the mass shooting at Brown University. two days later The incident killed a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, another elite school near Boston.
That’s according to three people familiar with the matter who were not authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation and spoke on condition of anonymity. Investigators have identified a person of interest in the shooting and are actively searching for that person, two of the people said.
On Saturday, the gunman at Brown killed two students and injured nine others in a classroom in the school’s engineering building before escaping.
About 50 miles (80 kilometers) north, MIT professor Nuno FG Loureiro He was shot to death at his home in the Boston suburb of Brookline on Monday night. The 47-year-old physicist and fusion scientist died in hospital the next day.
The FBI has previously said it knew there was no connection between the cases.
How’s the Brown investigation going?
It’s been almost a week since the Brown shooting. There have been other high-profile attacks in which it took days or longer to arrest or find those responsible, including last year’s brazen five-day killing of the CEO of UnitedHealthcare on a New York City sidewalk.
However Frustration grows in Providence It was stated that the person who carried out the attack managed to escape and a clear image of his face has not yet been revealed.
“There is no discouragement among people who understand that not every case can be resolved quickly,” state attorney general Peter Neronha said at a news conference Wednesday.
Authorities searched the area for evidence and believed the attacker may have scouted the scene beforehand, asking the public to check phone or security footage that may date from the week before the attack. But they gave no indication that they were any closer to catching the shooter.
Investigators released several videos from the hours and minutes before and after the shooting of a man who, according to police, matched witnesses’ description of the attacker. In the clips, the person is standing, walking and even running streets just outside campusbut always with masks on or their heads turned.
Although Brown officials say there are 1,200 cameras on campus, the attack took place in an older part of the engineering building where few cameras are located. Investigators believe the shooter entered and exited through a door overlooking a residential street bordering the campus; This may explain why the cameras Brown owned did not capture images of the person.
Providence Mayor Brett Smiley said Wednesday that the city is doing “everything possible” to keep residents safe. But he acknowledged that this was a “scary time in the city” and that families were likely having difficult conversations about whether to stay in the city over the holidays.
When asked if the city is safe, Smiley said, “We’re doing everything we can to reassure people, to provide comfort, and that’s the best answer I can give to that difficult question.”
Although it is not unusual for someone to disappear after such a high-profile attack, it is rare.
What can be learned from past research?
In such targeted and highly public attacks, attackers often kill themselves or are killed or arrested by police, said Katherine Schweit, a retired FBI agent and expert on mass shootings. When they escape, searches can take time.
“The best thing they can do is what they’re doing right now, which is to continue to gather all the facts they have as quickly as possible,” Schweit said. “And actually the best hope for a solution will come from the public.”
In the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, it took investigators four days to catch the two brothers who carried it out. In a 2023 case, Army reservist Robert Card was found dead by suicide two days after killing 18 people and wounding 13 in Lewiston, Maine.
Man accused of killing conservative political figure Charlie Kirk He surrendered about a day and a half after the attack on the Utah Valley University campus in September. And Luigi MangioneHe pleaded not guilty to murder charges in the slaying of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan last year and was arrested five days later at a McDonald’s. Pennsylvania.
Felipe Rodriguez, a retired New York police detective sergeant and adjunct professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, said it was clear that the shooters learned from others who were captured.
“Most of the time an active shooter will come in and try to do what we call maximum carnage, maximum damage,” Rodriguez said. “And at this point they’re actually trying to escape. They’re evading the police in an effective way that I’ve never seen before.”
Investigators described the man they were looking for as being about 5 feet, 8 inches (173 centimeters) tall and stocky. The attacker’s motive remains a mystery, but authorities said Wednesday that no evidence suggests a specific person was targeted.
MIT mourns the loss of a respected professor
Loureiro, who is married, joined MIT in 2016 and last year was named head of MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center, where he works to advance clean energy technology and other research. When he took over the management, more than 250 people were working in seven buildings at the center, which is one of the largest laboratories of the school. He was a professor of physics and nuclear science and engineering.
He grew up in Viseu in central Portugal and studied in Lisbon before receiving his doctorate in London, according to MIT. Before joining MIT, he was a researcher at a nuclear fusion institute in Lisbon, the university said.
“He shone a bright light as a mentor, friend, teacher, colleague and leader, and was universally admired for his outspoken, compassionate demeanor,” engineering professor Dennis Whyte, who formerly directed MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center, told a campus publication.
Loureiro said he hoped his work would shape the future.
“It is not an exaggeration to say that MIT is the place to find solutions to humanity’s greatest problems,” Loureiro said when he was appointed. leading the plasma science laboratory last year. “Fusion energy will change the course of human history.”
___
This story has been updated to delete a reference to MIT being an Ivy League school.
___
Richer and Tucker reported from Washington. Associated Press reporters Mark Scolforo in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and Hallie Golden in Seattle contributed.
