A grand jury in Mississippi has determined the July 4 death of Nolan Xavier Wells was a drowning. No charges will be filed.
Wells, a Black 18-year-old college student, died after going on a boating trip with three white friends. His body was found July 6.
Wells family attorney Ben Crump issued what he called a “forceful” statement on the findings:
Today, the State of Mississippi is attempting to close the chapter on Nolan Wells’ death without getting to the truth.
Mississippi’s own pathologist found two bruises on the back of this young man’s head and informed investigators of them early in this investigation. An independent autopsy documented traces of blood and recent blunt-force injuries to the back of Nolan’s head and his back. To this day, not one person has explained how they got there.
Dr. Mitchell also wrote that the record does not establish whether Nolan entered the water on his own or was forced, or whether he was conscious when he went in. We don’t know how Nolan died, and neither does the State of Mississippi. Mississippi must keep investigating, and if it will not pursue this to the end, the Department of Justice should.
We are releasing the final independent autopsy report in its entirety, so everyone can read it for themselves. This grand jury result leaves us with more questions than answers. Nolan’s family will not rest until we know what happened to him, and neither will we.
My sources said Dr. Roger Mitchell, the forensic pathologist who conducted the independent autopsy of Nolan Wells requested by the family, testified before the grand jury investigating the case. Those sources also said prosecutors seemed to push the narrative of an accidental drowning death. The young men who accompanied Nolan Wells on the outing have all denied wrongdoing and said Nolan was alive when they last saw him.
Politicians, thought leaders, civil rights leaders, and others, including Crump and Nolan Wells’s family, spoke at last week’s Congressional Black Caucus Annual Legislative Conference in Washington, D.C., as the Mississippi grand jury was concluding its work on the highly controversial case.
The question of race hung heavily over the case and the CBC conference as the waiting game for the grand jury’s final report on this controversial death continued into Friday. It isn’t hard to see why: A young Black man traveled to Horne Island with his white friends and was left behind as the others traveled home.
At a press conference in July, Nolan Wells’s mother said she and his father talked to their son about the dangers of being “the Black friend,” as Mississippi Today reported. “Me and his dad had conversations with him all the time, not just about the importance of understanding our history as Black people, but also the importance of how you have to move in certain spaces.”
Many Black parents warn their children about being the only person of color in a group — the “token” friend. LeRon Barton wrote in July in the Good Men Project about the Nolan Wells case and being “the only one”: “In social situations, work, traveling, and wherever you reside, knowing that no other person shares your skin color can be a isolating, anxiety inducing experience at best, potentially mentally, emotionally, and physically dangerous situation at worst. The thing about being the only one is you are always aware of it.”
We don’t know why Nolan Wells died. We do know this grand jury report should not be the end of his story.
April Ryan, host of The Contrarian’s The Tea With April Ryan, is the longest-serving Black woman reporter in the White House press corps. She is the author of “Black Women Will Save the World,” “The Presidency in Black and White: My Up-Close View of Three Presidents and Race in America,” “Under Fire: Reporting from the Front Lines of the Trump White House,” and “At Mama’s Knee: Mothers and Race in Black and White.”
