Tipsheet

Is This Why There's Little to No Video Footage of the Brown University Shooter?

Matt Vespa
Matt Vespa  |  December 18, 2025 6:55 AM

Why is there so little video footage of the Brown University shooter? It’s ridiculous that a school with an $8 billion endowment would allow this suspect to disappear into the night. It’s been days since the attack, and this manhunt is a shambles. From top to bottom, this must be the worst crisis any authority has handled; no one knows anything. They literally said that at a presser, which still baffles me. On the camera front, perhaps posting where said devices are on the Internet is a bad idea (via NY Post):

The failure to capture the gunman after five days has resulted in New England on edge — and critics growing louder about the security and investigative failures by leaders of both Brown and the Providence, Rhode Island, Police Department. 

Even President Trump has started to raise questions: “Why did Brown University have so few Security Cameras? There can be no excuse for that. In the modern age, it just doesn’t get worse!!!” he posted on Truth Social. 

Since the shooting on Saturday, Providence cops and the FBI have released numerous grainy captures from doorbell cameras in the area showing the “person of interest” in the case, and have fielded over 200 “actionable” tips, but so far no concrete identifying information has been released. 

State Attorney General Peter Neronha told reporters Wednesday that authorities have “zero” information regarding a potential motive in the killings. 

[…] 

Brown University’s Providence campus has around 1,200 security cameras, according to president Christina Paxson, but the Barus & Holley building, which was completed in 1965, only has cameras at the front part of the building, which was renovated around five years ago, Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha told reporters Tuesday. 

“So, there’s the back part of the building, the old part, and the front part, the new part,” Neronha said. 

What a nightmare. When police must go door to door in nearby neighborhoods to ask residents for potential video footage from their security devices (Ring cams), you know this investigation is in trouble. On December 13, someone entered the engineering building on campus and opened fire, killing two students and wounding at least eight others. How the suspect entered the building is a mystery.  

Ok, Brown, but this stuff should have been fleshed out in the initial presser.