Brown University Shooting: Bodycam Footage Shows R.I. Police's Response to Deadly Attack

Rhode Island police released roughly 20 minutes of body camera footage from December's deadly Brown University shooting.

The Dec. 13 video shows the perspective of Providence Police Lt. Patrick Potter as officers worked to clear parts of the building and determine whether additional victims or a suspect remained inside, WPRI-TV reports. In the footage, Potter can be heard directing officers to conduct a careful, systematic search.

Potter told WPRI that he was working a downtown safety detail when he received a radio call reporting a shooting victim on the university campus. He said officers eventually reached a classroom, where multiple victims were found suffering from gunshot wounds.

“That was when we put out that this was an active shooter situation,” he said.

Two people were killed and nine others were injured in the shooting. Claudio Neves Valente, a 48-year-old former Brown University PhD student, was accused in the attack, as well as the fatal shooting of an MIT professor, and he was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound inside a New Hampshire storage unit days later. 

Potter, a 21-year veteran of the department, said he had not previously responded to an active shooter incident of that scale.

The footage also shows officers encountering and escorting an individual out of the building while checking for weapons and seeking information about additional people or gunfire inside.

Providence Mayor Brett Smiley and Public Safety Commissioner Steven O’Hara told WPRI in a Jan. 20 interview that they had reviewed the body camera footage and described it as graphic. Smiley said the city has been reviewing multiple public records requests to determine what footage could be released without retraumatizing the community.

O’Hara said officers were prepared due to prior active shooter training and said their response helped save lives. Smiley added that officers not only secured the scene but also provided emergency medical care.