Boston 25 News, January 2026
While hiding in a rented storage unit in Salem, New Hampshire—likely moments before taking his own life—Claudio Neves Valente recorded four brief video statements, his final words about the horrors he inflicted during the mass shooting at Brown University and in Brookline, Massachusetts, where MIT physics Professor Nuno Loureiro was murdered in his home. “I have no interest in being famous,” Neves Valente said. “I don’t give a damn about how you judge me or what you think of me.” But the statements, released by the Boston US Attorney’s office, taken together provide an insight into why this all happened.
Northeastern University Criminologist James Alan Fox is the co-author of Extreme Killing: Understanding Serial and Mass Murder. He told Boston 25 that he believes Neves Valente, despite what he said, like other mass killers, was motivated to set across a simple message. “They want us to know, that they’re not just a nut who killed for no good reason. He had a reason; it’s just not 100% particularly clear. But he had a reason, and he’s not crazy,” said Fox. Fox believes Brown University was targeted because that’s where Neves Valente, a once promising physics student, dropped out of the Ivy League School’s program.
