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Chaz Nathan McGowen

Age : 28

Gender : Male

Race : White

Date : 09/30/2021

Location : 1900 block of South 13th Street, Franklin Woods Mobile Home Park

City : Niles Charter Township

County : Berrien

State : Michigan

Agency : Berrien County Sheriff's Office

Officer(s) :Preston Huddleston; Doug O’Dell

Cause of Death : Gunshot

Event : Killed by police during domestic disturbance and mental health crisis

OPEN RECORDS SUMMARY :

On 09/30/2021, Berrien County Sheriff’s Deputies Preston Huddleston and Doug O’Dell shot and killed 28-year-old Chaz Nathan McGowen inside a residence in the Franklin Woods Mobile Home Park in Niles Township after police responded to a 911 call reporting a man with a knife.
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The 911 caller told dispatch that McGowen would not leave the residence, possessed a knife, was acting aggressively and had made a stabbing motion with the knife. She said she feared for the people in the house, described McGowen as not being in his right mind and warned that he might do something when police arrived. Dispatch also advised Huddleston and O’Dell that McGowen had previously been assaultive toward police.
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Huddleston and O’Dell met witnesses outside and could hear yelling from inside the residence. Two other people remained inside. The deputies repeatedly asked McGowen to come outside, but he declined and told them to come inside. The deputies then entered the residence and directed the other two people to leave.
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Huddleston entered carrying a less-lethal beanbag shotgun while O’Dell provided cover with his handgun. According to the subsequent prosecutor’s review and body-camera evidence, McGowen repeatedly picked up and put down a knife while talking with the deputies. At one point he questioned whether they were actually police, and the deputies gave him their badge numbers. McGowen also told the deputies to shoot him and said he was ready to die, making the suicidal and behavioral-health component of the encounter explicit.
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According to the prosecutor’s account, McGowen eventually moved toward the deputies with the knife. Huddleston fired a beanbag round into his abdomen. McGowen moved toward the back of the kitchen but continued holding the knife, and Huddleston fired a second beanbag round. Police said McGowen then rapidly advanced toward the deputies while holding the knife.
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Huddleston dropped the beanbag shotgun and drew his handgun. Huddleston and O’Dell each fired four rounds, for a total of eight police gunshots. The autopsy documented nine gunshot wounds or wound locations involving McGowen’s head, face, chest, shoulder, arms and hands, as well as two beanbag impact injuries. He died from multiple gunshot wounds.
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Unlike many fatal police encounters, substantial evidence from the final confrontation was preserved on the body cameras worn by both deputies. Michigan State Police obtained and reviewed those recordings along with 911 calls, witness interviews, physical evidence, crime-lab evidence, the autopsy and written statements from Huddleston and O’Dell.
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Berrien County Prosecutor Steven Pierangeli subsequently reviewed the Michigan State Police investigation. In December 2021, his office concluded that Huddleston and O’Dell reasonably believed they faced an imminent threat of death or serious injury and ruled the shooting legally justified. Neither deputy was criminally charged.
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The evidence also establishes that McGowen was experiencing an acute crisis during the encounter. In addition to the 911 caller saying he was not in his right mind, McGowen repeatedly made statements asking police to shoot him and stating that he was ready to die. The toxicology examination later detected methamphetamine, cannabinoids and a fentanyl metabolite, and the prosecutor cited the methamphetamine concentration when discussing McGowen’s behavior.
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No affirmative evidence located for this update establishes that McGowen’s family or an eyewitness publicly disputed the body-camera-supported account of the final confrontation. No encounter-related wrongful-death or civil-rights lawsuit was identified.
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OFFICER BACKGROUND
The deputies who shot McGowen were Preston Huddleston and Doug O’Dell. Their identities, omitted from much of the initial coverage, were disclosed in the prosecutor’s later detailed review. Both deputies fired four handgun rounds.
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The prosecutor’s report provides unusually extensive documentation of the deputies’ actions because both were wearing body cameras. That evidence allowed the Michigan State Police and prosecutor to compare their written accounts against video and audio from the encounter rather than relying exclusively on the officers’ statements.
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The Berrien County Sheriff’s Office had nevertheless faced significant excessive-force allegations before McGowen’s death. A 2019 ABC57 investigation examined allegations that a Berrien County deputy used excessive force during an arrest in Eau Claire. The investigation reviewed body-camera and dash-camera footage, police reports, court records and outside expert assessments and also identified another man who alleged similar treatment by a sheriff’s deputy.
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That second case had resulted in a federal civil-rights lawsuit by Jason Zuhl against Berrien County and Deputy Jason Haskins. Zuhl alleged that Haskins used excessive force while deputies executed a search warrant by striking him in the eye with a flashlight. The federal litigation proceeded on Zuhl’s Fourth Amendment excessive-force claim against Haskins after other claims and defendants were dismissed.
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Later records show that allegations of excessive force against Berrien County deputies continued after McGowen’s death. In a 2025 federal civil-rights action, a county detainee alleged that several Berrien County deputies used unnecessary force while removing him from a courtroom, including an allegation that a deputy shoved him by the neck while other deputies already controlled him. In 2026, a federal judge allowed portions of that civil-rights case to proceed while dismissing other claims.
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The most important distinction in McGowen’s individual case is the existence of body-camera evidence from both shooters. The prosecutor’s detailed review identifies Huddleston and O’Dell, documents the less-lethal attempts preceding the gunfire and provides an evidentiary record against which the deputies’ account of the shooting can be evaluated.

SOURCE LINKS :

https://wsbt.com/news/local/police-release-name-of-man-they-was-shot-killed-by-officer-while-holding-knife
https://www.wzzm13.com/article/news/berrien-county-sheriffs-deputies-shoot-kill-man-during-overnight-altercation/69-c478c5de-bd7b-4f30-8a90-01ac7ccbe1e3
https://www.abc57.com/news/male-fatally-shot-by-police-after-allegedly-charging-at-officers-with-a-knife
https://www.fox17online.com/news/msp-investigating-berrien-county-officer-involved-shooting-that-left-man-dead
https://www.leaderpub.com/2021/10/01/police-identify-man-killed-following-niles-township-altercation/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sal40HDJBQ
https://www.wsjm.com/2021/12/10/173957/
https://www.abc57.com/news/deputies-cleared-in-fatal-shooting-of-man-with-knife
https://www.abc57.com/news/too-much-force-part-3
https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/michigan/miwdce/1%3A2012cv01380/72870/40/
https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/michigan/miwdce/1%3A2025cv00725/115963/13/