RS Reports
'Any parent that would be in this situation, you would do anything to find out what happened to your child, and that is what we're here to do,' said Wells’ mom
At the NAACP national conference in Chicago on Wednesday, attorney Ben Crump announced the preliminary independent results from a private autopsy of 18-year-old Nolan Wells. Crump said the initial results from an independent pathologist found the cause of death as “undetermined pending investigation.”
The autopsy was conducted by Dr. Roger Mitchell, a forensic pathologist and president of the National Medical Association. Mitchell’s report found that Wells’ date of death was unknown. He conducted the autopsy on Friday, July 10, four days after Wells’ body was found on a barrier island off the coast of Mississippi. After the press conference, the United Cajun Navy, which was involved in the search for the teen, clarified that Wells was found wearing only a bathing suit.
Mitchell’s autopsy was the second autopsy conducted on Wells, and the independent examiner said he didn’t have all of the information available to determine cause of death because parts of Wells’ body were missing. Crump said this could be because parts were held back by the medical examiner in the first autopsy, which Mitchell explained was common while undergoing further testing. The first autopsy was conducted on July 7 by a state medical examiner in Mississippi.
