Civil rights lawyer releases cellphone data in Mississippi teen death case
Attorney Ben Crump disclosed forensic findings from Nolan Wells' phone after a grand jury said no criminal conduct was involved, while the family continues to question the drowning conclusion.
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump on Thursday released forensic data from the cellphone of 18-year-old Nolan Wells, a Black college student whose death in Mississippi was ruled by a grand jury to show no criminal conduct. The disclosure comes days after the grand jury concluded the teen’s death was consistent with drowning and that he was not involved in a fight or altercation.
Crump said the forensic examiner traced messages sent and received on Wells’ phone and linked them to the device’s location from the day before he disappeared until his family retrieved it. > "The messaging, as I said, was very telling … some of his own friends were concerned about [how] people on Horn Island can be racist," Crump said.
The family’s legal team has repeatedly asked for the grand-jury materials and the official autopsy report to be made public. They have also urged federal authorities to investigate, noting that both the state’s official autopsy and an independent examination listed the cause of death as undetermined, with empty airways and stomach and fresh bruising on the head.
"What this means is that there is no water in the stomach, there is no water in the lungs and there is no water in the throat," family attorney Liza Park said.
A witness testified that Wells slipped off a boat on July 4 but continued socializing afterward, and the panel could not determine whether the fall caused the bruising. The family disputes the notion that Wells would have stayed on the island without his phone, which was later recovered.
Forensic examiner Andrew Garrett noted that GPS data showed Wells opened his phone on the boat at 2:17 p.m., after which the device was locked and continued to receive messages as it moved by car and was eventually retrieved by his family. An attorney for some of Wells’ friends said the new phone data did not clarify their clients’ involvement.
District Attorney Angel Myers McIlrath issued a statement after Crump’s news conference, reaffirming confidence in the ongoing investigation.