{"id":409634,"date":"2026-09-24T21:08:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-24T21:08:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/409634\/"},"modified":"2026-09-24T21:08:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-24T21:08:10","slug":"orlando-firm-surfaces-new-evidence-in-nolan-wells-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/409634\/","title":{"rendered":"Orlando firm surfaces new evidence in Nolan Wells case"},"content":{"rendered":"

ORLANDO, Fla. \u2013 Civil rights attorney Ben Crump<\/a> held a press conference in Orlando Thursday, unveiling new forensic evidence in the death of 18-year-old Nolan Xavier Wells \u2014 including cell phone GPS data<\/a>, recovered Snapchat messages and details from a state medical examiner\u2019s autopsy report.<\/p>\n

Wells, a Black college freshman and football scholarship athlete, disappeared during a July 4 boating trip to Horn Island off the Mississippi Gulf Coast. His body was found two days later on the island\u2019s northwestern tip. <\/p>\n

A Jackson County grand jury recently declined to charge anyone<\/a> in his death, finding the evidence consistent with drowning.<\/p>\n

Crump\u2019s team worked with Andrew Garrett of Orlando-based Garrett Discovery to extract data from Wells\u2019 phone, producing more than 1 million artifacts of data. Garrett reconstructed a GPS-based timeline tracking the phone\u2019s movements throughout July 4 \u2014 from a morning McDonald\u2019s stop to Horn Island and back to a boat ramp that evening.<\/p>\n

\"\"FILE – A person holds a picture of Nolan Xavier Wells during a news conference at National Action Network headquarters, Friday, July 10, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo\/Yuki Iwamura, File) (Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have every moment of Nolan\u2019s phone from morning to night,\u201d Garrett said.<\/p>\n

Garrett said Wells\u2019 phone recorded movement back on the mainland after the group left Horn Island \u2014 despite friends saying Wells chose to stay behind. He added that some of that phone activity occurred after Wells died, but before his parents retrieved the device.<\/p>\n

The team also manually recovered 282 pages of deleted Snapchat messages from Wells\u2019 friend groups and provided them to the Jackson County district attorney. Garrett confirmed data was deleted from the phone after Wells last had it in his possession.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn order for that to be done, somebody had to take a user action to delete data,\u201d Garrett said.<\/p>\n

The state medical examiner\u2019s autopsy found two roughly two-inch contusions on the back of Wells\u2019 skull \u2014 and no water in his lungs, airways or stomach. Both the state medical examiner and independent forensic pathologist Dr. Roger Mitchell listed the cause of death as undetermined.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t know what happened to Nolan Wells,\u201d Crump said. \u201cIf you know anything, come forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

Crump mentioned a news conference tentatively scheduled for next Thursday in Atlanta where Mitchell would present and explain both autopsy reports in detail.<\/p>\n

Grand jury declines to charge anyone in teen\u2019s death<\/p>\n

On September 21, 2026, A Mississippi district attorney announced a grand jury convened to determine if someone should be charged in the case, found no evidence of criminal misconduct.<\/p>\n

The grand jury report noted that examinations of Nolan Wells\u2019 body by the Mississippi medical examiner\u2019s office and an independent forensic pathologist hired by Wells\u2019 family found the cause and manner of death to be undetermined.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf credible evidence comes to light in the future that suggests Mr. Wells\u2019 death was non-accidental, this matter should be represented to the Jackson County Grand Jury for further consideration,\u201d the grand jury\u2019s report said.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 by WKMG ClickOrlando – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORLANDO, Fla. \u2013 Civil rights attorney Ben Crump held a press conference in Orlando Thursday, unveiling new forensic…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":409635,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[1335,139,141,140],"class_list":["post-409634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-orange-county","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=409634"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409634\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/409635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=409634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=409634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=409634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}