Rhode Island shooting suspect was recipient of miraculous healing decreed by Vatican in 2025

The suspect in a double shooting in Rhode Island this month is apparently the same man whose unexpected recovery after a health crisis as a newborn was deemed a miracle by the Vatican in 2025.

Police in Newport, Rhode Island, said in a July 24 press release that Tyquan Johnson was facing arrest for felony assault with a firearm in connection with a double shooting in Newport on July 19.

The police dispatch, which said Johnson was considered “armed and dangerous,” identified the suspect’s birthday as Jan. 14, 2007. That date is the same birthday as the Rhode Island-born “Tyquan” noted by the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints in its information page on Blessed Salvador Valera Parra.

Valera was a 19th-century-born Spanish priest who carried out “many works of a spiritual and social nature,” particularly during cholera epidemics and earthquakes, according to the dicastery.

In considering his beatification, the dicastery said it reviewed the Rhode Island case, in which a pregnant mother was hospitalized after her amniotic sac ruptured. The baby was ultimately delivered via cesarean section, after which doctors “did not perceive any heartbeat.”

The attending physician at that point “invoked Salvador Valera Parra,” the dicastery said, after which the baby recovered his heartbeat without any external assistance and made a full recovery.

Pope Leo XIV approved the dicastery’s promulgation of the miracle on June 20, 2025. In a July 18, 2025, statement, Diocese of Providence Chancellor Father Timothy Reilly said the miracle was “a reminder of the power of prayer and the intercession of holy men and women.”

“God is indeed close to us. We are thrilled that this recognition will move the cause of beatification and canonization forward for Venerable Servant of God Salvador Valera Parra,” the priest said at the time. Reilly did not respond to requests for comment on the crime incident this month.

Rhode Island police said another individual was wanted in connection with the shooting, though it did not identify that suspect in its press release.

In the years following the miracle birth the Johnson family moved to Hampton, Virginia. Tyquan Johnson subsequently told local media that the promulgation of the miracle “changed my faith a lot because I’m destined to be in this world.”

“If God didn’t want me in this world, he would just let me die on that table. But he wanted to give me a second chance,” he said.