What we're covering
• Authorities hunting for the perpetrator of the deadly mass shooting at Brown University released a new enhanced photo Tuesday and asked the public to pay attention to body movements, posture, gait and other patterns to help identify the person of interest.
• A person of interest detained earlier in connection with the attack has been cleared, but the early focus on that person may have delayed the investigation by up to a day, a CNN security analyst said.
• The shooting left two students dead and nine others injured at the Ivy League school in Providence, Rhode Island, where classes and exams have been canceled. The campus remains on edge, and the governor has ordered a sweeping review of school safety measures. At least 75 school shootings have unfolded this year in the United States.
“You ask for the public’s help when you’re stuck,” former FBI special agent says of ongoing investigation
Authorities have repeatedly urged the public to help identify the person of interest seen in a new enhanced photo released Tuesday by asking people to parse the gunman’s physique and distinct gait seen in videos and photos.
“If I was in the FBI and we were asking people to say, ‘do you recognize his gait, the way he walks’, you’re in trouble,” Steve Moore, a former Supervising Special Agent with the FBI, told CNN’s Elex Michaelson.
“You ask for the public’s help when you’re stuck and the more general the information you give them, the less specific information you actually have,” he added.
Moore, however, acknowledged that authorities are working hard on the manhunt and that snowfall from the day after the shooting would’ve likely compromised any evidence left behind.
Providence Mayor Brett Smiley said earlier authorities are appealing to the public’s help partly because the location of the building where the students were shot had limited security camera coverage and the school’s network of cameras couldn’t follow the suspect into the surrounding neighborhood.
Hundreds of tips, DNA swabs and new video: Inside Day 4 of the Brown University manhunt
Investigators working out of a makeshift task force in a third-floor office of Providence police headquarters received hundreds of tips on Tuesday as they raced to identify the individual responsible for this weekend’s shooting at Brown University.
As tips came in, they were triaged based on how valuable, immediate or detailed they were, according to law enforcement sources familiar with the investigation. Anything that looked like it might yield a viable suspect went to the top of the pile.
Detectives weighed how to approach certain potential suspects who emerged from tips or other leads. Investigative strategy discussions dictated who might be put under surveillance, who might be brought in for a conversation, or who might be interviewed wherever they were located. Alibis were to be established and checked, and buccal swabs were taken from those willing to supply DNA.
The collection of DNA samples may suggest investigators believe they recovered DNA at the scene, perhaps from an item thought to be discarded by the suspect or something they touched. That would also suggest that the DNA is not in the national DNA criminal database, CODIS, or investigators would have already established the shooter’s identity.
The more public-facing developments involved video: The FBI worked up some materials for the investigative team, including an “enhanced” still picture of a person of interest walking down the street and a video timeline complete with maps to display his walking route and where each image was captured.
The latter was later taken down by the FBI to protect the information about what address cooperated by supplying video to the authorities, the sources said, and replaced with a new video that followed the person’s walking trail through Providence with close-up video playing in a box to the side of the wide shot. This was meant not just to help investigators establish the person of interest’s routes but also to generate better, more telling images in hopes a member of the public would recognize them.
The fact that nearly every image that was probative was recovered by cameras that were off campus drew questions from reporters about why none were recovered from the Barus-Holly engineering building on campus, where the shooting unfolded.
Investigators told reporters that video was recovered from multiple cameras in the building that showed students running and the chaos during and after the shooting. But the person of interest appeared to have traveled through an older part of the structure where there was little or no camera coverage.
Once again, it raised questions in the minds of detectives: Was the shooter lucky? Or were they already familiar with the target location, where victims would be on a Saturday –– and where cameras would not?
The sun is setting on Day Four of the manhunt for the Brown University shooter. Here's the latest
Days after a mass shooting at Brown University left two students dead and nine others hospitalized, authorities in Providence, Rhode Island, are still searching for the suspect.
Here’s the latest on the ongoing investigation:
- New videos: Law enforcement today released a new photo, “enhanced” videos and a video timeline showing a person of interest’s movements in the hours leading up to Saturday’s shooting. Much of the footage was captured off-campus as authorities say the building where the shooting happened was old and had “fewer, if any” cameras.
- Help from the public: Authorities hope the videos detailing the person’s gait and posture will help the public identify them. Police have also asked residents to provide additional video footage, including from equipped vehicles like Teslas, dating back at least a week.
- One victim still in critical: One shooting victim remains in critical condition, two have been discharged from the hospital and the six others are in various stable conditions, hospital officials announced today. Authorities said there is no evidence Ella Cook, who was fatally shot Saturday, was targeted. MukhammadAziz Umurzokov, 18, has been identified as the other student who was killed.
- Anxieties are high: Students are eager to get home to safety and security after Saturday’s attack, with many people in Providence still feeling shaken up. The university has reiterated its commitment to community well-being as Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee said he’ll form working groups to discuss safety and mental health.
Person of interest was "casing the area" before shooting, police chief says
The person of interest who is now the focus of an intense manhunt is believed to have stayed in the area for at least five hours before the attack was carried out, according to Providence Police Chief Col. Oscar Perez Jr.
Perez told reporters Tuesday the person was in the area near Brown University continuously, for at least five-and-a-half hours, before entering the Barus and Holley engineering building, where he shot and killed two people and wounded nine others.
“What we do know is definitely that he was casing the area, and again that’s what criminals do prior to committing a crime,” Perez said. He said authorities believe the person was in the area from around 10:30 am ET on Saturday morning. The shooting occurred around 4:00 pm ET.
Pressed later whether the person may have left the area sometime after 10:30 am and come back later, Perez indicted they did not believe that was the case.
“10:30? From then until the time of the shooting?” a CNN reporter asked. “As far as we know,” Perez replied.
Authorities are asking the public to pay close attention to a series of videos released Tuesday, specifically to the person’s body movements, posture, gait and other patterns to help identify him, Perez said.
Asked whether authorities have any name at all for the person or a name they are looking at behind the scenes which they could not release to public, Perez replied, “No.”
Brown University officials and law enforcement warn against doxxing as search for shooter continues
Brown University said it has seen “harmful doxxing activity” toward at least one person at the Ivy League school in the wake of Saturday’s shooting, and warned against the “irresponsible, harmful, and in some cases dangerous” speculation swirling online about who the shooter might be.
Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha issued a similar warning that jumping to conclusions was a “really dangerous road to go down.”
“If that name meant anything to this investigation, we would be out looking for that person, we would let you know we were looking for that person,” Neronha said at a Tuesday news conference .
Family of Brown student killed in mass shooting says he is not a statistic, wants people to remember him as “a real person”
The family of a Brown University student killed in Saturday’s mass shooting wants people to know their son’s name and photo rather than seeing him as another statistic, his sister said.
MukhammadAziz Umurzokov, 18, had “real ambitions, goals and aspirations like anyone else would,” said his sister, Samira Umurzokova.
Her brother, a first-year student at Brown, was one of two students killed in the attack.
“He never took anything for granted, ever… Him and the other victim, they’re not just numbers, they’re not just statistics,” Umurzokova said.
She said nearly 100 people have reached out in the wake of the tragedy, sharing photos and heartfelt stories about her brother.
“It just sort of reinforces his character in my head,” Umurzokova told CNN’s Anderson Cooper. “He touched so many people in such a little amount of time.”
Video evidence of suspect is limited by university's unique location, mayor says
The search for the person of interest has left some wondering: How does someone commit a mass shooting and apparently walk out and disappear?
Mayor Brett Smiley said part of the explanation has to do with security camera coverage and the location of the building where the students were shot.
“Brown is different than maybe some universities in that it is very much integrated with a residential neighborhood,” Smiley said. “This building is on the literal edge of the campus, and the person of interest walked out the door (and) as soon as he stepped onto the sidewalk, was no longer on campus.”
The school’s network of cameras couldn’t follow the suspect into the surrounding neighborhood, Smiley said.
“It’s part of the reason we keep asking for the community’s help so much, is because even though this occurred on campus, the route of travel and all of the video evidence you’ve seen other than that very first video has been video from off campus,” Smiley said.
“The path that we’re following for this person of interest is actually off campus,” the mayor added.
No connection between fatal shooting of MIT professor and Brown University shooting, officials say
There is no apparent connection between Saturday’s mass shooting at Brown University and the shooting Monday of a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, officials said at a news conference.
Nuno F.G. Loureiro, 47, died at a hospital in Brookline, Massachusetts, on Tuesday morning after being shot at his home the night before, according to The Associated Press. Loureiro was the director of the university’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center as well as a professor in departments for nuclear science and engineering and physics, AP reported.
“At this time, there seems to be no connection,” FBI Special Agent Ted Docks responded when asked if there is any connection between the two shootings. Providence Chief of Police Oscar L. Perez Jr. said, “Not that we know of,” when asked the same question.
Officials will return Wednesday with an update unless there is a “meaningful” development
Officials will return on Wednesday with further updates on the investigation into Saturday’s mass shooting at Brown University “unless there is a meaningful update,” said Providence Mayor Brett Smiley.
Rhode Island AG asks public to leave identification up to authorities
Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha said it’s really dangerous for people to jump to conclusions and identify possible persons of interest.
When asked about a particular name, Neronha said if the “name meant anything to that investigation, we would be out looking for that person.”
He cautioned that jumping to conclusions was a “really dangerous road to go down.”
“I know that in today’s age, there are lots of things that people read into things,” Neronha said at Tuesday’s news conference. “It’s just a dangerous thing to do, and I would leave it to (law enforcement) to identify persons of interest and let us run them down.”
What the public can do for investigators, he added, is help figure out who the person of interest is.
“We hope to have more information out that will help you do that,” he said.
Police still interviewing students who were in the classroom where the shooting happened
Police are still conducting interviews with all the students who were in the classroom where the shooting unfolded Saturday, Providence Chief of Police Oscar L. Perez, Jr. said at a Tuesday news conference.
No evidence student killed in shooting was targeted, police chief says
There is no evidence that Brown University student Ella Cook, who was killed in Saturday’s mass shooting, was targeted, Providence Chief of Police Oscar L. Perez Jr. said.
“No, not at this point,” the chief responded when asked by a reporter whether officials have any evidence Cook, 19, may have been targeted. MukhammadAziz Umurzokov, 18, was identified as the other student who was killed.
Brown University has 2 security systems that can be activated in an emergency, president says
Brown University President Christina Paxson said the institution has two security systems that can be activated during an emergency – and one is not used during an active shooting because it would cause a rush of people inside.
“We have two security systems that we can activate in a time of an emergency. One is a system that sends out text messages, phone calls, emails, and it was activated within minutes of the incident. Those messages went out to 20,000 individuals.”
The other alert system, Paxson said, is a siren system.
“There are three sirens placed across campus. Those get activated when there is a broad-scale emergency and we want people to rush into buildings.”
Search teams will likely canvass new areas Wednesday because they are working outward from university
The search for the suspect in Saturday’s mass shooting involves canvassing a grid that begins with Brown University’s campus and then expands outward, said Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha.
It’s “entirely possible” Wednesday the teams “be canvassing places that we haven’t canvassed yet” because they will be working in an outward direction, Neronha said at the news conference.
Building where the shooting took place was on edge of campus and had "fewer, if any" cameras, AG says
The shooting took place at the very edge of Brown University in an older part of a building that has “fewer, if any” cameras, leaving police to rely mainly on videos from the neighboring residential area to try to identify the person of interest, Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha said Tuesday.
“There is no footage that depicts this individual that would be useful in identifying him, that we have not released to you,” Neronha said.
“I think you can tell from, frankly, the not-very-helpful quality of the initial footage, that our standard is pretty low,” he said.
Other videos "show things like chaos after the shooting" Rhode Island AG says
Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha said Tuesday certain videos from inside a Brown building have not released because they “show things like chaos after the shooting.”
“What we have released to you are videos of this person of interest,” Neronha said.
The attorney general said those other videos likely could get released in the course of a prosecution.
But what they don’t show, Neronha said, is the person of interest, and that’s why they haven’t been released.
Person of interest seen on video "casing the area" hours before Saturday's shooting, police say
Police say the new videos show the person of interest “casing the area” in the residential neighborhood next to Brown University hours before the shooting on Saturday, Providence Chief of Police Oscar L. Perez, Jr. said.
“That’s what criminals do prior to committing a crime,” Perez said at a Tuesday news conference.
Brown president "deeply saddened" to see people questioning university's commitment to safety
Brown University President Christina Paxson said Tuesday during a news conference the institution is committed to safety and security.
“The primary point that I wanted to address before we get to questions is that Brown is deeply committed to the safety and security and well-being of our community, and I’ve been deeply saddened to see people questioning that,” Paxson said.
“We understand that as time goes on, there is maybe a natural instinct to assign responsibility for a tragic event like this,” she said.
“Anxiety and fear is very natural, but the shooter is responsible,” Paxson added.
Investigators will get job done but public should remain patient, Rhode Island AG says
Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha says he is confident in the investigation into Saturday’s mass shooting on Brown University’s campus but urged the public to remain patient.
Rhode Islanders “should take confidence” in the work of the federal, local and state law enforcement and prosecutors on the case who are “veterans of what they do,” Neronha said at the news conference.
“They’re smart, they’re professional and they’re getting the resources from the mayor and the governor that they need, the state police as well, to get this job done and I’m confident they are going to be able to do that. Just need a little bit of patience,” Neronha continued.
The investigation poses challenges, Neronha said, but it’s going smoothly.
“I think the investigation in a case like this, which is a challenging one, is going really well,” Neronha said.
