Brown University police chief placed on leave after mass shooting

Brown University police chief Rodney Chatman has been placed on leave more than a week after the mass shooting that killed two students and injured nine others in Providence, Rhode Island.

School president Christina Paxson said Monday evening that Brown will commission a review of campus safety and the response to the Dec. 13 shooting that investigators say was carried out by former grad student Claudio Manuel Neves Valente. 

“A review like this is standard,” Paxson said in a statement. “As it takes place, Vice President for Public Safety and Emergency Management Rodney Chatman is on leave, effective immediately.”

Paxson said former Providence Police Department chief Hugh T. Clements will serve as interim chief for public safety and police while Chatman is on leave. Chatman was appointed to his role in 2021 and previously worked in campus safety at the University of Cincinnati and the University of Utah.

Paxon also shared some immediate security measures the school is taking. More security cameras will be installed across campus, including at the Barus & Holley engineering building where the shooting happened. The manhunt for the shooter had been hampered by a lack of usable surveillance video footage in the area, a source told CBS News last week. 

Also on Monday, the U.S. Department of Education announced that it will conduct a “program review” of Brown to see if the Ivy League college met the safety standards required to receive federal student aid. The department said Brown “seemed unable to provide helpful information about the profile of the alleged assassin” in the days after the shooting.

“Students deserve to feel safe at school, and every university across this nation must protect their students and be equipped with adequate resources to aid law enforcement,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement. “The Trump Administration will fight to ensure that recipients of federal funding are vigorously protecting students’ safety and following security procedures as required under federal law.”