Raw Moments of Chaos: New Police Video Released in Deadly Brown University Shooting
Providence, R.I. — A little more than two months after tragedy struck the Brown University campus, city officials have released a new video showing the raw, confusing moments of the initial police response to the deadly shooting that left two students dead and nine others wounded. The newly public materials, consisting primarily of redacted body camera footage and frantic audio dispatches, offer a sobering glimpse into the chaos first responders faced on that tragic December afternoon.
The incident, which took place on December 13, 2025, in the university’s Barus and Holley Building, claimed the lives of 19-year-old sophomore Ella Cook and 18-year-old freshman MukhammadAziz Umurzokov. The students were tragically shot during what was supposed to be a safe, late-afternoon study session for an economics final.
The footage, clocking in at around 20 minutes and released on Monday, comes from the body camera of the officer-in-charge during the initial response. Officials made clear that the material is heavily redacted, with Mayor Brett Smiley stating that the most graphic and violent images were deliberately withheld. This decision, he explained, was a difficult balance between maintaining a commitment to public transparency under the state’s Access to Public Records Act and protecting the victims’ families from further trauma.
What the public can see and hear, however, paints a picture of intense uncertainty and immediate peril. The materials include audio of a Brown University police officer calling city police at 4:07 p.m., reporting “confirmed gunshots at 184 Hope Street” and noting they had a victim but didn’t know their location. Just four minutes later, campus police called back with a description: a suspect “wearing all black and a ski mask.”
The body camera video itself, often obstructed and containing long blacked-out or silenced segments, captures officers scouring the building, with backpacks and scattered personal items visible on the floor. A chilling exchange is recorded as officers coordinate their search, with the officer-in-charge cautioning colleagues, “As of right now, with the absence of better information, we’re going to go with the shooter might still be in this building, so use caution.”
The gunman was later identified as 48-year-old Claudio Neves Valente, a former Brown graduate student from the early 2000s. Authorities eventually found Valente dead in a storage unit in Salem, New Hampshire, and connected him to a separate fatal shooting of an MIT professor. Investigators later stated that the attack was premeditated, with Valente planning the shocking act for several years.
The release of this new video footage ensures the Providence community remains engaged with the difficult details of the December tragedy. For the university and the loved ones of Ella Cook and MukhammadAziz Umurzokov, the newly public material is a fresh reminder of the day their lives were shattered, a day now indelibly marked in the history of the Ivy League institution. City officials confirmed the delay in release was in part to accommodate the families until a memorial service could be held on campus, allowing them a moment of peace before the painful records became public. The community continues to grapple with the aftermath of an unthinkable act of violence.
