The Brown University mass shooting which killed two students may be connected to the assassination of an MIT professor two days later, police have said.
An unidentified gunman opened fire on the Brown campus in Providence, Rhode Island on Saturday, and investigators failed to track the attacker down.
Two days later, an unknown assailant fatally shot Massachusetts Institute of Technology Professor Nuno Loureiro inside his Boston home around 50 miles away.
FBI agent Ted Docks said Tuesday ‘there seems to be no connection’ between the two shootings, but investigators told WPRI Thursday that there may be a link.
The outlet did not give further information about the connection, but said it marks ‘a new break in the case’ which has baffled investigators for days.
Mukhammad Aziz Umurzokov, of Virginia, and Ella Cook, of Alabama, were fatally gunned down during the mass shooting at Brown on Saturday.
They were in a study session held at the Ivy League’s School of Engineering Barus and Holley Building when a gunman burst in shortly after 4pm and opened fire.
The gunman fired 40 rounds, killing the two students and wounding 12 more.
The Brown University shooting which killed two students and the assassination of an MIT professor two days later may be connected, police have said. (Pictured: Victim Ella Cook)
Mukhammad Aziz Umurzokov (pictured left), the second Brown University victim killed on Saturday, has been remembered by his roommate as an aspiring neurosurgeon and ‘ball of joy’
FBI agents have released several photographs and videos of two ‘persons of interest’, but they are yet to name a suspect in the tragedy.
A different ‘person of interest’ was detained at the Hampton Inn hotel in Coventry the day after the shooting, but they were later released without charge.
Two days after the Brown shooting, at around 8.30pm Monday evening, married father-of-three Loureiro was shot dead in his home in Brookline, Boston.
Loureiro’s neighbor and friend, Louise Cohen, said she discovered his body after hearing shots disturb the peace of their beautiful area on Gibbs Street.
Cohen said she was lighting a menorah candle when she heard gunshots fired. She rushed to the hallway of their building and found Loureiro lying on his back.
The professor’s heartbroken wife was also in the entry along with another neighbor, and they scrambled to dial 911. Loureiro was taken to hospital but died the next day.
Loureiro’s neighbors remembered him as a kind-hearted, ‘wonderful man’, while students flocked to the candle-lit vigil in his memory.
Married father-of-three Nuno F.G. Loureiro (pictured), 47, was gunned down at his home in a leafy Boston suburb at 8.30pm by an unknown shooter who is still on the loose
MIT paid tribute to him as, ‘a lauded theoretical physicist and fusion scientist’ who became the director of the college’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center in 2024, an institution with more than 250 full-time researchers.
Loureiro specialized in nuclear science, engineering and physics. He leaves behind ‘many devoted students, friends, and colleagues’, according to his MIT obituary.
His academic career started at the Instituto Superior Técnico in Lisbon, Portugal, where he gained a physics degree.
Loureiro obtained a doctorate in physics from Imperial College London in 2005, before starting post-doctoral work at Princeton later that year.
He also worked at the UK Atomic Energy Authority’s Culham Centre for Fusion Energy between 2007 and 2009.
MIT President Sally Kornbluth acknowledged that the beloved professor died in the wake of the Brown University shooting just two days before.
Loureiro’s neighbors remembered him as a kind-hearted, ‘wonderful man’, while students flocked to the candle-lit vigil in his memory, as shown in the photograph above
‘This shocking loss for our community comes in a period of disturbing violence in many other places,’ she said in a statement.
‘It’s entirely natural to feel the need for comfort and support.
‘If you or anyone you know would like counsel or just a listening ear, I encourage you to make use of our many campus resources.
‘In time, the many communities Nuno belonged to will create opportunities to mourn his loss and celebrate his life.’
The Norfolk District Attorney’s Office told the Daily Mail no arrests have been made.
‘This is an active and ongoing homicide investigation,’ they said in a statement. ‘No further information is being released at this time.’
