Last week, lauded theoretical physicist and director of the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center Nuno Loureiro was murdered in his home in Brookline, Massachusetts.
Since then, investigators have made several breakthroughs in the unusual case, linking the prime suspect to a separate deadly mass shooting at Brown University earlier in December.
The suspected shooter, Claudio Neves Valente, was found dead in a storage unit in New Hampshire on Thursday following a six-day manhunt. But as bizarre twists add up in the case, investigatorsand the surviving loved ones of his victims are left with more questions than answers.
As the Wall Street Journal reported over the weekend, Neves Valente, a physics graduate from Portugal, had a reputation for being difficult in class, despite being remembered fondly by others.
Perhaps most bafflingly, Neves Valente attended the same school — Lisbon’s Instituto Superior Técnico — as his future victim, Loureiro, where they were both students between 1995 and 2000, CNN confirmed. Neves Valente eventually pursued his graduate studies at Brown, linking him to the second institution where he’s suspected of committing a deadly shooting.
Former Brown physics professor Scott Watson, who spent a lot of time with Neves Valente at Brown, said he became “sometimes angry” about life at Brown in esoteric ways — complaining about the quality of the fish he was served, for instance.
“He would say the classes were too easy — honestly, for him they were. He already knew most of the material and was genuinely impressive,” Watson told the Associated Press.
Neves Valente left Brown in early 2001 and returned to Portugal to work for a telecom.
Classmates have suggested he may have become jealous of Loureiro’s illustrious career.
Roughly an hour before Neves Valente opened fire on students in a Brown lecture hall, a witness noticed he was wearing a mask and flimsy clothing, leading to an altercation, per the WSJ.
“Why are you harassing me?” he told the witness angrily after being followed and confronted.
All told, Neves Valenete killed three individuals and injured nine.
It’s a tragic story that still leaves plenty of questions unanswered. Why did Neves Valente single out his former classmate? Was there more to his desire to inflict harm on others?
“Claudio was obviously one of the best, but in class he had a great need to stand out and show that he was better than the rest,” former classmate Felipe Moura wrote in a Facebook post, as quoted by CNN.
“I never expected he would be capable of such a thing,” he added.
More on the murder: MIT Fusion Physicist Murdered in His Home
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