Fall River man charged in brutal double homicide after boxing dispute

A street sparring session on Aetna Street ended with two young men dead and Vitor Francisco Gomes walking away bloodied, carrying a bag police said held a gun and ammunition. By the time Gomes, 28, appeared in Fall River court, prosecutors had charged him with two counts of murder, unlawful carrying of a firearm and unlawful possession of ammunition. He pleaded not guilty and was ordered held without bail as investigators built their case from witness accounts, surveillance video and what officers found near the scene.

Police said the violence erupted Wednesday, June 10, 2026, around 8:50 p.m. near 90 Aetna Street in Fall River’s South End. The victims were identified as Pablo Henrique Rocha-Dasilva, 20, of Whitman, and Eduardo Cardoso da Silva, 19, of Fall River. Both were pronounced dead at the scene, and police said one had significant facial trauma while the other had a metal pitchfork impaled in the back of his head.

Witness statements and video reportedly pointed to an “informal boxing match” or sparring at the house before the killings. One witness told police that Cardoso da Silva knocked Gomes out and wanted to stop fighting, while Gomes wanted to continue. A police report said Gomes punched one victim 11 times and struck him repeatedly with a stone, and another witness said Gomes fired three shots at a parked Honda Accord. That sequence, not a random street attack, became the key to the case prosecutors laid out in court.

Bristol County District Attorney Thomas Quinn III called it “one of the most brutal and depraved acts of violence” he had seen. Fall River Acting Police Chief J.T. Hoar said the violence was not random and appeared tied to people who knew each other. Mayor Paul Coogan said he had never heard of a pitchfork being used that way and thought it was probably a yard-work tool, while defense attorney Kenneth Van Colen argued the case may have been self-defense and said others had threatened Gomes and his family at his house.

For now, the bloodied walk from Aetna Street to the courtroom is only the beginning. The next test comes on July 14, 2026, when the case returns to court and the fight over motive, self-defense and the evidence behind this double homicide moves into the open.