FIRST ON FOX: Newly obtained police and fire department records detail the chaotic, multi-building response to the Brown University shooting that left two students dead and multiple wounded.
The shooting unfolded at the Barus and Holley building shortly after 4 p.m. on Dec. 13 near Brown’s Sciences Library and surrounding academic buildings along Thayer, Hope and Waterman streets, according to Providence Police (PPD) and Fire Department dispatch records reviewed by Fox News Digital.
In the hour immediately after the shooting, police reported one possible suspect in custody in an academic building nearby, one other encounter with a possible suspect in that building and one person being detained in a vehicle nearby.
Police encountered a possible suspect in a basement in a building at 167 Thayer St. at 4:22 p.m. on Dec. 13. They then reported one person in custody at 4:38 p.m. after encountering a possible suspect in a bathroom in that building. They also reported one person detained in a vehicle at 4:42 p.m.
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These on-scene detentions are separate from the individual detained the following morning at a hotel in Coventry, who was later released. Fox News Digital has reached out to the PPD for comment.
Initial 911 calls reported a man shot in the back near Manning Walk. Within minutes, Brown University police notified city authorities that multiple people had been shot, expanding the response footprint to several buildings, including Barus and Holley, 167 Thayer St., 115 Waterman St. and 184 Hope St.
Dispatch records reveal that police radio traffic confirmed an active shooter, with callers reporting 10 shots fired inside hallways and classrooms within the Ivy League building.
Witnesses initially described a male suspect wearing all black clothing and a face covering. Police later released the initial suspects.
As reports flooded in, hundreds of students sheltered in place across campus buildings, including Solomon Hall, where police said that roughly 150 to 300 people were barricaded inside.
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Providence Fire Department officials quickly declared a mass casualty incident, according to records, with the department dispatching rescue task forces and requesting ballistic protection for medics who were ordered to standby until police could secure each scene.
Hospitals across the region were notified, with Rhode Island Hospital designated to receive the most critically injured victims.
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Fire department logs show victims were located both inside and outside buildings, including in hallways, stairwells and basement areas.
As officers cleared buildings floor by floor, police reported multiple victims exiting the building and groups barricaded on upper floors awaiting rescue.
Officials indicated there was no longer an active threat, though searches continued for hours as officers methodically cleared basements, rooftops, mechanical rooms and stairwells amid concerns of additional suspects or victims.
By early evening, buildings were declared secure, and buses were brought in to relocate sheltered students to reunification points.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the Providence Police Department for more information and requested the audio recordings of the 911 calls related to the shooting but has not yet received them.
Police said the gunman was Claudio Neves-Valente, 48, a onetime physics prodigy from Portugal who later died by suicide after a multistate manhunt.
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Neves-Valente was a Portuguese national and former Brown student who studied physics from the fall of 2000 through the spring of 2001 before withdrawing from the program by 2003, according to Brown University President Christina Paxson. She emphasized that Neves-Valente had no recent affiliation with the university at the time of the campus shooting.
The Providence Police Department has not publicly released details regarding a motive.
Authorities said Neves-Valente killed two students and injured nine in the Brown attack, then traveled to Massachusetts and killed Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Nuno Loureiro two days later.
The Daily Mail reported that Dr. Bruno Goncalves, president of Portugal’s Institute of Plasma and Nuclear Fusion, said Neves-Valente did not maintain any known relationship with Loureiro in the decades after they studied together there, underscoring that the attack was not the result of an ongoing rivalry or dispute.
Instead, Goncalves said Neves-Valente may have fixated on what Loureiro had come to represent.
“The strongest theory is that Claudio saw Nuno as a symbol of the academic and professional success that he himself had failed to achieve,” Goncalves said.
Fox News Digital’s Stepheny Price contributed to this report.
