Person of interest detained in fatal mass shooting at Brown University

Highlights:

• Two students dead and nine people wounded in shooting
• Person of interest detained; shelter-in-place order lifted
• Incident happened while exams were taking place

A man was taken into custody on Sunday at a Rhode Island hotel and held as a "person of interest" in the Brown University shooting that left two students dead and nine wounded amid year-end final exams at the Ivy League school, authorities said.

Providence Police Chief Oscar Perez said at a midday news conference that the person detained in connection with Saturday's gun violence was in his 20s but declined to share further details. Perez said earlier on Sunday that authorities were not seeking other suspects at this time.

Detectives anticipated that the person in custody would be formally charged Sunday night, city public safety spokesperson Kristy DosReis said.

Other news media outlets, including the Washington Post and NBC News, cited unnamed sources identifying the man as military veteran Benjamin Erickson, 24, who previously resided in Wisconsin.

A person by the name of Benjamin W. Erickson served as a US Army infantryman from May 2021 to November 2024, leaving the service with the rank of specialist without ever being deployed, military officials told Reuters. But they could not confirm whether he was the man detained over the Brown University shooting.

FBI Director Kash Patel earlier Sunday said in a post on X that the person of interest had been detained in a hotel room in the Rhode Island town of Coventry, a 30-minute drive from the Brown campus. An FBI team specializing in cellular data analysis used geolocation information to track the suspect, Patel said.

The mass shooting — the latest of nearly 400 in the US this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive — shook the community at the university, one of the oldest in the United States. The school canceled exams and classes for the rest of the year, and the campus was quiet on Sunday as a light snowfall blanketed the city.

Providence Mayor Brett Smiley said that authorities, as of midday on Sunday, had not yet contacted all of the victims' family members because some were traveling. He invited residents to a previously planned event on Sunday to light a Christmas tree and a menorah to mark the first night of Hanukkah.

"It is quite clear that if we can come together as a community and shine a little bit of light tonight, I think there's nothing better that we could be doing," Smiley said.

Authorities release video of suspect

Seven people injured at Brown University were in stable condition, Smiley said. One remained in critical but stable condition, while another had been discharged, he added.

Shelter-in-place orders at the university and nearby areas were lifted on Sunday. Smiley said earlier in the day that residents should expect a visible police presence across the city.

The gunman fled after shooting students in a classroom in Brown's Barus & Holley engineering and physics building, where outer doors had been left unlocked while exams were taking place, officials said on Saturday.

Authorities on Saturday released a short video clip of a person of interest dressed in black walking near the engineering building. Providence Deputy Police Chief Timothy O'Hara said on Saturday the individual may have worn a mask, but officials were not certain.

Brown President Christina Paxson told reporters that all or nearly all of the victims were students, adding: "This is the day one hopes never happens, and it has."

Students caught by surprise

Ref Bari, 22, a graduate student at Brown, said he was inside the Barus & Holley building when he heard a series of loud popping sounds that appeared to be gunfire.

Bari ran out of the building and asked another student running in the street if he could hide with her and her friends and she agreed. They returned to her basement apartment and hid in the bathroom.

"She trusted me," he said. "The only connection between us is we're both students at Brown but beyond that, we don't know each other."

Teaching assistant Joseph Oduro, 21, told CNN he was in a classroom that was attacked.

"The first couple of gunshots went straight to the chalkboard right where I was standing," Oduro said. "Who knows, if I didn't duck, maybe I'm not here today."

A student next to him took two bullets to the leg and was due to undergo surgery on Sunday, he said.

Jack DiPrimio, another graduate student at Brown, said he was initially not concerned when the university went on lockdown because he had experienced many active-shooter drills. The drills have become more common in the US as attacks targeting students have increased.

"I had faced so many lockdowns in high school and even a few at my undergrad, so I wasn't that worried at first," DiPrimio said in a TikTok video after coming out of a five-hour lockdown. "Maybe I was desensitized."