(CNN) — On July 4, a group of friends boarded boats and set out from Ocean Springs, Mississippi, to celebrate the holiday on nearby Horn Island.
It was a trip many had been looking forward to all year, their attorneys would later tell CNN. But it would end in tragedy after Nolan Wells never made it home.
In the weeks since Wells’ body was discovered along the shoreline of the barrier island, questions around his manner of death have fueled conjecture and fractured a once tight-knit community.
Attorneys representing Warren Hudson, Jax Pitalo and Morgan Seymour say despite cooperating with investigators, their clients have effectively become pariahs in their hometown and have been subjected to death threats and defamation.
And, they said, the allegations they were somehow involved in their friend’s death have made it even harder as they try to find ways to grieve the young man they’ve known since middle school.
“The biggest tragedy of this entire thing is that Nolan unfortunately lost his life and nobody knows definitively what happened,” their attorney, Tyler Cox, said, adding all three of his clients have been questioned by authorities in the case.
“These guys haven’t been able to mourn the loss of their friend and brother Nolan Wells,” Cox told CNN Wednesday.
“They left the island at 4:30 pm … So, we don’t know what happened to Nolan after 4:30,” he said. “We want to know just as much as anybody.”
A tow call ignites controversy
Cox estimates there were hundreds of boats and thousands of people on the island that day. Wells and his friends arrived just before 11 am, he said.
The last time Warren Hudson saw Wells was around 3 pm, his attorneys say.
“They had this little comedic moment because at the time Nolan was kind of holding and cradling a girl that he had met on the island,” Cox said. “You know him being one of Nolan’s best friends, Warren kind of gave him kind of a chuckle, like, ‘Oh, I see you with this girl.’ You know, ‘Hope everything goes well for you.’”
But an hour later, the attorneys told CNN, the group began noticing problems with the bilge pump on one of their boats, the Triton. The water in the hull was rising so quickly it almost covered the battery, and Cox said his clients began to panic and shout to their friends it was time to leave.
What happened next has become the subject of conspiracy and scrutiny.
Cox said there has been an assumption Wells was left “on this deserted, remote island with no access to a phone or no access to anyone else to help him.”
But he was far from alone, the attorney said – and Wells was not the only person who didn’t make the return trip with the group of friends.
“That’s just how it is here. You can always find another ride off the island, and again, there were 2,000 other people there, so he wasn’t left alone by any means,” Cox said.
He also acknowledged many people find it suspicious his clients were in possession of Wells’ phone, but, he said, it’s common practice to drop anchor 50 feet offshore and swim to the island.
“I don’t know anything more corrosive to a cell phone than salt water,” he said. “When they left, not only was Nolan’s phone on the boat, so was five other people’s … and everyone collected the phones after” they got back.
Everyone, of course, except for Nolan. A Wells family friend later tracked the device to his friend’s home, and Elmore Wonsley, Nolan’s father, has said he arrived later in the night to collect his son’s car and keys.
Edward Paltzik, a defamation attorney who also represents the three men, said in recent days edited audio of the emergency tow call his clients made that day has turned a tragic case into a circus.
“The Sea Tow call — and the hundreds of versions of it now circulating — is a red herring. It’s distracting people from what matters,” Paltzik said.
At the end of the day, he added, any audio portraying his clients in a false light is defamatory, and they plan to pursue all legal claims.
A video purporting to contain audio of the Triton’s call has gone viral after the creator who posted it claimed to have cleaned up the background noise and allegedly revealed incriminating statements.
CNN has obtained and reviewed the same audio but found it to be inconclusive.
“We’re winnowing it down to the worst of the worst – the worst of the worst offenders who have said the worst things, who have the largest platforms, who have caused the most damage,” Paltzik said. “It’s going to be a lengthy process.”
A tragedy compounded by grief and threats
In the weeks since the case became national news, the attorneys say their clients have been subjected to a barrage of threats – both at home and online.
“Some of them can’t even go back to school because of the threats. Their families have had threats. Some of them can’t even go home,” Cox said.
Two of the men were accosted at a local restaurant, and they’ve also been refused service in town, Cox said. Some of the alleged threats were deemed serious enough three people were charged with crimes, The Associated Press reported. The suspects — who allegedly threatened witnesses and officials connected to the investigation — do not appear to have any connection to the families in Mississippi.
But Cox stressed his clients only have two feelings toward Nolan Wells’ family: Empathy and sympathy.
“If there’s anybody out there that is targeting or harassing the Wells/Wonsley family, that needs to stop immediately and they need to apologize for doing it,” Paltzik said.
“I want to be clear. It’s not them versus us. Never has been, and I’ll tell you, never will be.”
Cox rejected any claims his clients were somehow motivated to treat Wells differently because of his race.
“All the old people in Mississippi may have thought something a long time ago, but not these young men,” he said. “I think they completely regret even going out to the island that day.”
But, despite all the rumors and conspiracies, Paltzik said two things can be true:
“Nolan’s death is an incomprehensible tragedy – incomprehensible,” he said. “But for us to be where we are today – where we have other folks receiving death threats, other folks receiving hate, and folks being defamed – I think that magnifies the tragedy.”
The-CNN-Wire
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