Police Report Reveals New Details In MIT Professor's Killing: Reports

BROOKLINE, MA — A report from the Brookline Police Department has revealed some new details Tuesday about the December shooting of MIT Professor Nuno Loureiro by Claudio Neves Valente. The records were made public by the Norfolk County District Attorney's Office after the Boston Herald successfully appealed an initial denial of a public records request.

According to the 97-page report, Loureiro’s 12-year-old daughter heard the doorbell ring at their apartment on Gibbs Street at approximately 8:30 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 15 and saw someone standing at the door of the shared first-floor foyer space with a package. She then returned to her unit to tell Loureiro, who went to answer the door himself. She then heard between four and six gunshots and rushed back to find her father lying on the ground with multiple bullet wounds. He was also found by his neighbor, Louise Cohen. Upon examining the crime scene, police discovered ballistic damage to the stairs in the room as well as six shell casings.

In a description provided by Loureiro’s daughter given to police, the shooter was wearing a yellow reflective vest, dark blue clothing, and a winter hat. Valente was captured on surveillance footage just before the shooting wearing those same clothes, according to the report. Other footage also captured him hours before in the areas of Commonwealth Avenue and Babcock Street as early as 8 a.m., according to a report from Boston 25 News.

Valente, 48, was also responsible for the Brown University shooting on Saturday, Dec. 10 that killed two students and critically injured nine others. The Portuguese national was ultimately found dead by a self-inflicted gunshot wound at a storage facility in Salem, NH on Thursday, Dec. 18.

Officials say Loureiro and Valente knew each other, but the extent of their relationship isn't clear: Both studied physics at Instituto Superior Técnico in Lisbon, Portugal at the same time more than 25 years ago. Valente was terminated from a job he held at IST in 2000. He executed both crimes in a three-day span after traveling up north from Florida in late November. The Department of Justice released transcripts of multiple video messages recorded by Valente in January, however minimal references were made to Lourerio’s killings in the four videos.

Lourerio was a decorated professor of nuclear science and engineering. He first came to MIT in January 2016 as an assistant professor in the Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering before becoming a full-time teacher in 2021.In 2024, he was named the director of Plasma Science and Fusion Center Director, one of the university’s largest and most prominent labs. He is survived by his wife, Ines, and their three children.

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