The body of 18-year-old Nolan Xavier Wells was recovered Monday off Horn Island, a barrier island roughly 10 miles from the Mississippi Gulf Coast, days after he failed to return from a July 4 boat trip with friends. His family has since retained civil rights attorney Ben Crump and is calling for a full accounting of the events surrounding his death.
According to The Associated Press, Sheriff Ledbetter said Wells and a group of friends made the trip to the island by boat on July 4, though he did not come back to the mainland with the rest of the group that afternoon. His mother, Christine Wonsley, reported him missing later that night. Search teams from multiple agencies — among them the U.S. Coast Guard, the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources, and the National Park Service — turned up his body on Monday morning off the coast of the island. Jackson County coroner Bruce Lynd told CBS News that the identification was made through dental records. Lynd said an autopsy was performed on Tuesday, with no findings released publicly.
Investigators were receiving cooperation from the people who had been with Wells, Sheriff Ledbetter said. "From the people we've talked to, it sounds like he chose to stay on the island with the assumption that he was going to ride back to the mainland with someone else," Ledbetter told The Associated Press. Wells was last seen on the island at approximately 3 p.m. on July 4, according to Crump's office.
Anyone who was near the northwest tip of Horn Island on July 4 — the location where Wells' body was later recovered — has been urged by the sheriff's office to submit any original, unedited photos or videos they captured that day, according to CBS News. Investigators also want to hear from anyone who witnessed a confrontation, disturbance, or anything out of the ordinary on the island. In a separate statement, Ledbetter took aim at social media activity surrounding the case, cautioning the public not to circulate unconfirmed claims that could interfere with the investigation, according to The New York Times.
"We will not rest until every fact about what happened to Nolan on Horn Island is brought into the light," Crump said in a statement, according to The Associated Press.
A wide receiver on the football team at Southwest Mississippi Community College, Wells had his 19th birthday coming up the month after his death, according to the Guardian. The National Park Service classifies Horn Island as a wilderness area, and reaching it requires a private boat — there is no other means of access, according to USA Today.