Authorities have asked the public for any footage they might have of the gunman who fatally shot two students and wounded nine others at Brown University, even as they released a new video timeline and a slightly clearer image of a possible suspect.
Investigators provided no indication on Tuesday that they were any closer to zeroing in on his identity. In all the videos made public, the suspect’s face was masked or turned away, and authorities have only been able to give a vague description of him as being stocky and about 5 feet, 8 inches (173 centimeters) tall.
Officers have been canvassing around Providence in search of clues that might help them figure out who was behind Saturday’s campus shooting.
Surveillance video the FBI posted online before it was removed showed a person in dark clothing walking along multiple sidewalks for about an hour starting shortly after 2 p.m. Saturday. The streets were all within a few blocks of the Brown University engineering building where the shooting occurred.
Some clips show the person walking in front of some properties several times. In one, the person abruptly turns around and runs in the other direction when someone approaches.
Two clips taken minutes after the shooting show the person walking away from a parking lot and then along a street.
Police have received about 200 tips, and Col. Oscar Perez, the Providence police chief, asked the public on Tuesday to look at their camera systems in the area to see if they have footage that might help officials identify the suspected gunman.
“We’re looking for a moment that is shorter than someone taking a breath,” Perez said.
No clear video of the shooter; motive unknown
A lack of cameras and clear video of the gunman has continued to frustrate both authorities and the community. While Brown President Christina Paxson confirmed on Tuesday that the campus has 1,200 cameras, law enforcement says there is no clear video of the shooter from inside the engineering building.
Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha defended the investigation as going “really well” as he pleaded for public patience in locating the suspected killer.
Large questions remain, particularly about the shooter’s motive. When pressed about a connection to ethnicity, political motive or culture, Neronha said, “That is a dangerous road to go down.”
Brown alumnus Chris Kremer joined about 200 others at a somber church service on campus for the victims on Tuesday. He lives a block from the scene and often goes to the building where the shooting happened. Many in the community are thinking how easily they could have been among the shot, he said.
He said it was better to attend the service than to sit alone being sad, depressed and scrolling through his phone.
“It’s always nice to be in a big exalted space when you’re thinking kind of big heavy thoughts,” Kremer said. “I guess people for thousands of years have found that to be something of a salve, so I’m hoping that a little bit of that works for me tonight.”
The attack and the shooter’s escape have raised questions about campus security, including a lack of cameras, and led to calls for better locks on campus doors.
Paxson said the university has two security systems. One system, activated at a time of emergency, sent out text messages, phone calls and emails that reached 20,000 people. The other system features three sirens across the campus and was not activated Saturday, a decision Paxson defended because doing so would have caused people to rush into buildings, including the one where the shooting was happening.
“So that is not a system we would ever use in the case of an active shooter,” she said.
Brown’s website says the sirens can be used when there is an active shooter, but Paxson said it “depends on the circumstances” and the location of the shooter.
Providence remained tense on Tuesday as additional police were sent to city schools to reassure worried parents that their kids would be safe. Ten state troopers were assigned to support police sent to beef up security at schools, district Superintendent Javier Montañez said.
Providence public schools canceled after-school activities and field trips for the week as a precaution.
Locals expressed fear as well as defiance as the investigation continued Tuesday.
“Of course it feels scary. But at the same time, I think that if the person really wanted to scare us, we shouldn’t allow him or her to win,” said Tatjana Stojanovic, a Providence parent who lives next door to the Brown campus.
Others say the attention on security measures does little to address the real issue.
“The issue isn’t the doors, it’s the guns,” said Zoe Kass, a senior who fled the engineering building as police stormed in Saturday.
After spending of her life in schools where every door was locked and school shootings continued to persist, Kass said such security measures only created “the illusion of safety.”
Details have emerged about the victims, who were in the first-floor classroom in the school’s engineering building studying for a final.
Two of the wounded students had been released as of Tuesday, Brown spokesperson Amanda McGregor said. Of the seven people that remained hospitalized, Mayor Brett Smiley said one remained in critical condition, five were in critical but stable condition and one was in stable condition.
One of the wounded students, 18-year-old freshman Spencer Yang of New York City, told The New York Times and the Brown Daily Herald that there was a mad scramble after the gunman entered the room. Yang said he wound up on the ground between some seats and was shot in the leg.
Jacob Spears, 18, a freshman from Evans, Georgia, was shot in the stomach, “but through sheer adrenaline and courage, he managed to run outside, where he was aided by others,” according to a GoFundMe site organized for him.
Ella Cook, a 19-year-old sophomore who was one of the two students killed, was vice president of the Brown College Republicans and was beloved in her church in Birmingham, Alabama.
The other student killed was MukhammadAziz Umurzokov, an 18-year-old freshman from Brandermill, Virginia, who was majoring in biochemistry and neuroscience. His family immigrated to the U.S. from Uzbekistan when he was a kid.
