“Authorities collectively believe that we have identified the person and that the person is dead. He was responsible not only for Brown’s shooting, but for the death in Brookline.”said Massachusetts federal prosecutor Leah B. Foley, referring to the murder of the Portuguese physicist.
But who is Cláudio Valente, the man who will be the only suspect in three deaths, in two separate attacks, in the USA? Born in Torres Novas, the Portuguese arrived in the United States in August 2000 on an F-1 visa, to study, full-time, in this case Physics at Brown University.
He later obtained the legal permanent residence in the USA in April 2017, through the visa program, known as “green cards”, which makes up to 50 thousand visas available annually, through a lottery. After these tragic events, with the Portuguese as a suspect, US President Donald Trump decided to suspend this visa program.
Valente was enrolled at the North American higher education institution between 2000 and 2001. He was admitted to graduate school to study Physics, said Brown University President Christina Paxson. “He has no current connection with the university”, he said about the Portuguese, no known criminal history in the U.S., authorities said.
According to Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha, While studying at Brown University, the Portuguese was enrolled in a doctoral program, but later dropped out of the course.
Previously, Cláudio Valente Antes attended the same academic program as Nuno Loureiro in Portugal, between 1995 and 2000, said the Massachusetts federal prosecutor. He studied at the Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), in Lisbon, at the same time as the physicist at MIT.
According to the Associated Press, in the same year that Nuno Loureiro graduated in Physics at IST, in 2000, Cláudio Valente was subject to a termination process from a position he held at the University of Lisbon, according to the file of a termination notice from the then president of the institution.
In fact, according to an order dated February 18, 2000, signed by the president of IST at the time, João Hipólito, and published in Diário da República, it is mentioned: “Cláudio Manuel Neves Valente – the administrative contract for provision of the position of monitor at this Institute was terminated, as of February 29, 2000”.
The suspect’s last known address in the US was in Miami, Florida, US authorities said at the press conference, noting that the Portuguese man may have used European SIM cards, which made it difficult for security forces to find his location.
Valente also changed number plates to escape the authorities. The video surveillance images were crucial in identifying the suspect and monitoring the Portuguese man’s movements. “We have a video of him renting a car in Boston,” said the Massachusetts federal prosecutor.
“Investigators identified the vehicle he had rented in Boston and then driven to Rhode Island. The vehicle was seen at Brown’s door and there was security footage that showed a person who looked like him. There were ongoing financial investigations that linked him not only to the car but also to the hotels” where he had been, Foley said. He added that the car had been used to travel to Rhode Island, but also to return to Boston.
“Images that captured him approximately 800 meters from the professor’s residence in Brookline” were also recorded. “There is a video that shows him entering an apartment building, where the professor” Nuno Loureiro’s apartment is located, added the Massachusetts federal prosecutor. “And later that night, he was seen entering, about an hour later, a warehouse unit, wearing the same clothes he had been seen wearing shortly after the murder”, revealed the person in charge.
Cláudio Valente ended up being found dead in the early hours of this Friday, in a storage unit, next to a suitcase that contained two firearms and evidence that “corresponded exactly to that collected at the scene of the shooting“said Ted Docks, FBI special agent responsible for the case.