What happened to Nolan Xavier Wells, and do his friends know anything?
That’s the question his grandfather, Christopher Wells Sr., is posing to Facebook after sending off a barrage of posts about the teenager’s disappearance.
“Too many unanswered questions how can a Island that was searched yesterday produce my grandsons body this morning,” Wells Sr. wrote Monday. “There’s nothing right about this, Nolan Xavier Wells deserved the same things that people he knew and associated with will enjoy in life.”
The Jackson County Sheriff’s Office confirmed a body was recovered from Horn Island, Mississippi, Monday morning. A park ranger reportedly said it matched Wells’ description.
Wells was celebrating the Fourth of July with his friends before his disappearance. His grandfather said the young men were arguing before Wells disappeared. The incident has sparked national attention due to racial implications. Nolan was Black, and all his friends who were pictured on the boat are white.
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“Where is the video of the big fight that occurred Saturday evening before everyone left the island?” he asked on Facebook.
A viral video circulating online shows a panoramic view of water, but at one point, an argument can be heard in the background. The camera then pans to a group of young men in swimsuits talking on the beach. There is one Black man wearing a blue swimsuit. Many online believe that it is Wells.
However, Atlanta Black Star is unable to confirm the identities of the people in the video and the original source.
One witness, Matthew Lamp, claimed on Facebook he was in one of the boats when he heard the fight.
“One of my passengers is pretty certain he was part of the group that was almost fighting around 5 p.m.,” Lamp wrote on Facebook. He said the boat that Wells’ friends were in left the scene very quickly after the fight.
“The three people on my boat that saw it all say [the fight] was amongst themselves,” Lamp wrote on Facebook.
In the video, you can also hear swearing from the group of young men on the beach.
“One of the boat drivers did mention [Nolan] and his friends was fighting amongst themselves,” Deidra Archangel, another witness, wrote on Facebook.
Authorities searched all day Sunday into Monday for Wells after he disappeared.
Atlanta Black Star confirmed that Wells’ friends, Eli Jax Pitalo, Erick Alcantara, Wyatt Pyron, Warren Hudson, and Morgan Seymour, switched their accounts to private. Our reporter reached out to all of them for comment.
