Brown University Shooter Found Dead After Multi-State Manhunt

The suspect behind the shocking Brown University shooting has been found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound inside a New Hampshire storage facility, ending a multi-state manhunt that gripped the Northeast for nearly a week.

Claudio Manuel Neves-Valente, a 48-year-old Portuguese national and former Brown University graduate student, was identified as the shooter by Providence Police Chief Oscar Perez. Authorities say Valente was also responsible for the brutal murder of an MIT professor, Nuno Loureiro, tying two elite academic institutions to a crime spree few could have predicted.

Valente’s last known address was in Miami. He was a legal permanent resident who had previously attended Brown as a physics graduate student in 2001. Federal officials now confirm he re-entered the U.S. in 2017 under the Diversity Visa Lottery program, raising serious questions about how someone with his profile was able to re-enter the country without detection.

According to the U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts, Valente and Loureiro were connected through an academic program at MIT back in 1995, making this attack appear calculated and deeply personal.

The manhunt, which lasted six days and crossed through Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, involved local, state, and federal law enforcement. Authorities tracked Valente through a rental car location in Boston before ultimately locating him at a storage facility, where he was found dead. A satchel seen in security footage and two firearms were recovered at the scene.

This tragic and violent episode has brought attention not only to the failings in visa policy, but also to the quiet but dangerous potential for sleeper threats within our own borders. Even more disturbing is the connection to the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program a random lottery immigration scheme that allowed Valente to re-enter the U.S. after more than a decade abroad.

The same program was used by ISIS-linked terrorist Sayfullo Saipov in the 2017 NYC truck attack that killed eight people. Now, it's once again at the center of a national tragedy.

While Providence Mayor Brett Smiley attempted to focus on community unity at a Thursday night press conference, saying, “Tonight our Providence neighbors can breathe a little easier,” he notably made no mention of the MIT professor’s murder, which authorities confirmed hours earlier.

Here’s what we know:

• Valente was a green card holder through the diversity visa lottery system.

• He had no current affiliation with Brown University, but attended as a graduate student until 2003.

• He murdered MIT professor Nuno Loureiro an academic connection from his past.

• The manhunt covered three states and ended in a suicide at a storage facility.

• Authorities recovered two firearms and the suspect's belongings at the scene.

This case underscores the urgent need to reevaluate who we allow into our country and why. Randomized immigration policies like the diversity visa lottery are not just outdated they are dangerous.

Innocent Americans are paying the price for feel-good policies crafted by D.C. elites who are far removed from the consequences. Every visa granted without thorough scrutiny is a gamble, and as this case shows, some gambles cost lives.

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