FALL RIVER, Mass. — Nine months after a snowbound February night on Linden Street ended with two police officers wounded and a 40-year-old man dead, the Fall River Police Department on Thursday, November 5, released the body-camera video of the encounter and announced that prosecutors have found the officers' use of deadly force justified.

The department posted the video with a lengthy statement on its Facebook page. After an investigation by Massachusetts State Police detectives, "the Bristol County District Attorney's Office determined that the use of deadly force by members of our department on February 8, 2026, resulting in the death of Mr. Vaughn, was justified," the statement said. The statement did not say on what date the district attorney's office reached that finding.

Source: Fall River Police Department statement, reported by SouthCoast360

What the video shows — and why it came out now

The released video runs about 2 minutes and 42 seconds and cuts between several officers' body cameras. It opens on a card carrying the department's badge and a warning that the clips may contain graphic content and strong language, and it shows cruisers rolling down snow-choked streets and officers talking with a man beside an SUV hemmed in by snowbanks, before a struggle on the ground next to the vehicle. In February, police and the district attorney's office had released still images from the body cameras but withheld the video until the investigation was complete.

"We believe transparency is essential to public trust," the department said of its decision to release the footage. It called the events the video shows "deeply troubling and tragic," and extended condolences to Vaughn's family: "Regardless of the circumstances that led to this encounter, the loss of life is tragic, and we extend our condolences to those who continue to grieve his passing."

The February night: two 911 calls within an hour

Officers had two encounters with Nigel Vaughn that night, both in extreme cold after a snowstorm had buried the city, the department said. Late on Saturday, February 7, officers answered a 911 call reporting a man driving erratically on Linden Street who had gotten into an altercation with other people near Knight's Gas Station/Towing. Officers dealt with him there and told him to leave the lot, according to the Bristol County District Attorney's Office.

Within about an hour, early on Sunday, February 8, a second 911 call reported a man with a gun on the same block. Three officers found Vaughn in an SUV. When they tried to pat-frisk him for weapons, he "began to violently resist," prosecutors said in February, and the officers took him to the ground. Police say that on the ground Vaughn pulled a gun and opened fire.

Source: Mass Daily News, reporting the DA's account

One round hit an officer in the elbow. Another struck a second officer in the abdomen, where his bullet-resistant vest stopped it, the district attorney's office said. Officers returned fire. Vaughn was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead. Both wounded officers were treated and released from hospital care back in February. "Through the grace of God all of the officers lives were spared," District Attorney Thomas M. Quinn III said at the time, and the department's chief in February, Kelly Furtado, said that morning: "We are deeply grateful that our officers are able to return home to their families tonight."

The gun, the 'switch,' and Vaughn's record

Investigators found that Vaughn's Glock had been fitted with an aftermarket machine-gun conversion device, commonly called a "switch," which allows a pistol to fire multiple rounds with a single pull of the trigger, the department said. Vaughn was a convicted felon and was barred by law from possessing a firearm at all, police said. He had previously served state prison time for shooting three people at a Fall River sports bar in 2005, according to WBUR's reporting. "The suspect has a violent history and the officers were just doing their job on a brutally cold night," District Attorney Quinn said in February.

Three reviews, one conclusion

The criminal investigation was carried out by Massachusetts State Police detectives assigned to the district attorney, and Quinn's office found the deadly force justified. The department then ran its own administrative reviews: its Shooting Investigation Team agreed, finding the officers acted within department policy and 555 CMR 6.00, the Massachusetts regulation governing police use of force, and its Shooting Review Board voted unanimously that the officers followed department policies and procedures.

Under the legal standard the department cited, an officer may use deadly force when there is no reasonable alternative and the officer has an objectively reasonable belief that it is needed to protect against an immediate threat of death or serious bodily injury, without unnecessarily endangering innocent people. "At the time deadly force was employed, Mr. Vaughn was actively discharging a firearm at responding officers and had already struck two of them," the department wrote. The department also asked the public to judge the officers by what they faced, saying police "are often required to make split-second decisions under circumstances that are tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving." All of the accounts of the February shooting itself come from police and the district attorney's office; Vaughn was never charged over the events of February 8, and no public statement from his family had been found in the reporting as of November 6.

What happens next

No criminal case is pending, and the officers involved have never been publicly named — neither February's accounts nor Thursday's statement identified them, and Thursday's statement did not say whether the two wounded officers are back on duty, a question local reporters say they have put to the department. As of Thursday evening, the district attorney's office had not posted a final report on the shooting on its website; the office has posted final reports on earlier police shootings, including a December 2023 shooting in Fairhaven and an April 2024 shooting in Raynham, and reporters are seeking the district attorney's letter or report in this case and the date the finding was made. For Fall River residents, the release closes the formal reviews of one of the city's most serious police shootings in years — with the video now public, the February night on Linden Street can be watched, in part, by anyone.