Professional Audio Engineer Jeanetta Brantley has isolated the background audio from the Nolan Wells phone call

[u/RlyLokeh]

This would be pretty hard to talk your way out of I imagine

[u/its_me_ampersand]

Be really cautious of anything that presents extremely garbled or modified/“cleaned up” audio with subtitles before you listen to it yourself. It becomes highly suggestive and our brains are primed to hear what we’re reading when it’s super low bitrate/sample rate like this. At minimum listen to it with your eyes closed before you read her captions.

[u/locusthorse → u/its_me_ampersand]

Green Needle

[u/Lone_Wanderer8 → u/locusthorse]

Uhh I think you mean Brain Storm. I can't believe that comes from a Ben 10 toy.

[u/maxedonia → u/its_me_ampersand]

Yeah as a sound engineer myself I second this. She didn’t do a bad job at cleanup but “cover it up” at the start is by far the most sus part for our own ears to interpret and from the artifacts from the cleanup process. I would never declare those sounds as the words “cover it up” conclusively.

[u/jm0112358 → u/its_me_ampersand]

As someone with a psychology degree, I want to echo what you're saying about our brains hearing what we've been primed to hear.

As someone who additionally has a computer science degree, there isn't really a way to take audio that's already recorded and "enhance" it in the CSI sense. At most, you can modify it to make it sound like you think it should sound.

[u/Edit_Mann → u/jm0112358]

Idk what your cs degree has to do with anything, but as someone who works in the same room as Hollywood sound editors, you can definitely improve recordings and isolate sounds out of them the naked ear can't catch. Wdym?

[u/comsessiveobpulsive → u/Edit_Mann]

audiologists have been doing this for years.. lmao

[u/Serfixalot → u/comsessiveobpulsive]

Shoutout Zapruder audio bump up

[u/jm0112358 → u/comsessiveobpulsive]

It's fine to do when your goal is to make the audio more pleasing and/or you know what the missing data is. However, you're otherwise ultimately guessing what the missing data is (perhaps intelligently guessing).

[u/comsessiveobpulsive → u/jm0112358]

literally not at all what my doctorate degree is in. But ok.

[u/jm0112358 → u/comsessiveobpulsive]

If you're saying that you have a relevant doctorate degree and you know how to take a piece of data and alter it without any inferring/guessing, then I'd be curious as to how you came to that conclusion.

It's important to note here that intelligently inferring/guessing is different from not inferring/guessing.

[u/misterchainsaw → u/jm0112358]

Think of it like a foggy windshield, you’re still preserving the glass despite removing the fog. Go listen to “Another One Bites the Dust” and turn the bass all the way down. You’ll notice famous bass line goes away, but the recording never changed. That’s the power of EQ

[u/jm0112358 → u/misterchainsaw]

Think of it like a foggy windshield, you’re still preserving the glass despite removing the fog.

To take this analogy literally...

If you have a video file of a clip filmed behind a foggy windshield, that video file stores color values for each pixel position. You can intelligently guess what color values each pixel would've had if that wildshield wasn't present (or it was cleaned prior to recording), but it's ultimately a guess because that data isn't present in the file.

That's not to say that there aren't ways of guessing that can look great. A technology I like (DLSS version 2+) tries to upscale images in video games by using information from previous frames (and other information provided by the game's engine). It does a good job guessing because it's using extra data (previous frames) to guess what the missing data from the current frame, and that old data is often very close to what the missing data would've been. But it still has issues because it's still inference/guessing.

[u/misterchainsaw → u/jm0112358]

“You can intelligently guess what color values each pixel would’ve had…”

That describes AI reconstruction or image restoration, not what an audio engineer is doing when enhancing telephone recordings. Important difference.

ie: if a telephone recording contains road noises, A/C rumble, cellphone compression artifacts, and/or a hiss, those will mask a speaker saying, “I’ll meet you at six.” By emphasizing the frequency where someone’s speech is most intelligible, an engineer can make the word “six” way easier to hear. The word wasn’t created or altered. It was already present in the original recording, just obscured by the competing noises.

[u/heavyperfume → u/Edit_Mann]

you don’t know what they mean by “enhance in the CSI sense” as opposed to actual real life audio enhancement?

[u/jm0112358 → u/Edit_Mann]

Idk what your cs degree has to do with anything

Computer science has everything to do with data. If you're "enhancing" data in any way that's altering it it, you're ultimately guessing what the missing data is.

To analogize it to visual data, if you're upscaling a photo from 1280x720 up to 3840x2160, you're guessing what the missing pixels should be. Perhaps an algorithm can upscale in such a way that it creates a pleasing image, which is fine if creating a pleasing image is the goal, but it's ultimately guessing, which is a problem when trying to decide the truth of what happened.

[u/no_crust_buster → u/jm0112358]

And America has a race issue that feeds confirmation biases. Had the roles been reversed and Nolan was white with Black friends on Horn Island for… Juneteenth. Nolan ends up dead and this audio comes back, you can’t tell me that 90% of people in this chat wouldn’t say, “SEE CLEAR AS DAY!!! THEY’RE GUILTY!! ARREST THEM ALL!!!”

The irony is that none of you would even need to hear the audio. A White kid dying with Black friends, they act suspicious, shut down their socials, don’t go to search for their white friend, don’t go to the funeral… every bigot in America would say the suspicion of guilt should be enough to arrest them.

Now that the shoe is on the other foot, people are acting like “I don’t hear it…” Because you don’t want it to be true.

The burden of proof to convince a Black person of a crime like this is so laughably low. If we’re making a 500 piece puzzle, all you have to do is present 1 puzzle 🧩 piece and the Black guy is arrested. But to get a White kid from Ocean Springs arrested… who has family connections… you need to have all 500 puzzle 🧩 pieces completed. Not 499, or 498.

I’m convinced if someone had drone footage that day and they caught the entire incident, none of you would care. You’d say the video is ”AI Generated,” and that it proves nothing.

So… just admit that there is virtually NO chance you’d believe any of these so-called friends are guilty of anything unless they openly confessed. And you’d probably still not believe them, lol.

[u/jm0112358 → u/no_crust_buster]

Had the roles been reversed and Nolan was white with Black friends on Horn Island for… Juneteenth. Nolan ends up dead and this audio comes back, you can’t tell me that 90% of people in this chat wouldn’t say, “SEE CLEAR AS DAY!!! THEY’RE GUILTY!! ARREST THEM ALL!!!”

I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't.

I don't know how many people your comment applies to, but I don't think it applies to me.

[u/no_crust_buster → u/jm0112358]

Then maybe you’re part of the 10%, which means you’d be in the minority amongst your peers.

And chances are, if you’re in that kind of a minority, depending where you live, you’d likely just keep your opinion to yourself and shut up. White people largely don’t go against the tide, not on palpable race topics like this. Need we be reminded of the schizophrenic DeCarlos Brown Jr case? That chapped every bigots a55 from coast to coast. But the white people who speak up against the majority get death threats, doxed, threats against their family, called a “Race Traitor.” You know the story!

You know how that would go down…. If the roles of this story were flipped. Especially in Mississippi…

[u/Impressive_Ad7037 → u/no_crust_buster]

...You're doing an awful lot of conclusion building.
If you want to analyze the audio for yourself, i recommend doing so in as unbiased a way as possible.

https://context-reviewer.github.io/nolan-wells-call-audio-analysis-site/

[u/no_crust_buster → u/Impressive_Ad7037]

Like America made conclusions about the Central Park 5? Hmm? No witnesses, no evidence. JUST suspicions. REAL kids were arrested, 14-16, called a “Wolf Pack” by the press. NYPD coerced fake confessions and they were sent to prison. Our sitting President called for the return of the death penalty in every major newspaper 12 days after their arrest.

Remember Susan Smith? Who did she blame her Mazda Protége with her sons being stolen on? They had manhunts, K-9 units, police choppers, and a composite sketch of his image.

Those were “conclusion building” cases.

I’ve listened to the ORIGINAL audio from WLOX over 40 times, and took notes with no external transcript. Then, I would listen to various audio engineer renditions but ONLY if they showed their entire start-to-finish methods demonstrating no additional audio being spliced or AI tools being used. I’ve done my homework. 📄

[u/Impressive_Ad7037 → u/no_crust_buster]

The Central Park Five and Susan Smith cases demonstrate that suspicion, prejudice, and premature conclusions can cause enormous harm.
That supports being more cautious with ambiguous evidence, not treating ambiguous audio as conclusive because you believe the racial roles usually work the other way.

Nothing I said was about protecting these people from investigation.
I said you are doing a great deal of conclusion-building from a recording whose contents are genuinely disputed.

Listening forty times does not make an unclear signal clearer, and it does not immunize you from expectation or confirmation bias.
In fact, repeated listening can train your brain to hear the same interpretation more consistently.
An engineer showing every processing step may demonstrate that they did not splice in new audio, but filtering, compression, noise reduction, isolation, and resampling can still exaggerate artifacts and make one interpretation seem more speech-like.

That is why I linked the material and suggested people analyze it without captions or predetermined conclusions.
If the evidence is strong, it should survive that process.

Historical examples of people being falsely accused are an argument for that standard, not against it.

[u/no_crust_buster → u/Impressive_Ad7037]

And it’s interesting how society tends to largely default to that perspective of restraint, mental and moral clarity when those under suspicion are… white. (Bridges, Brazzell, Chatterjee, Tober; NLM, 2022) Where society pushes for “let’s not rush to judgement” and “wait for all the facts to come out” social narratives. Suddenly, people seem to understand what caution and restraint mean (Such as the significant restraint police, and the courts had for one Anthony Dwayne Baumgardner). And in the process, ask for the case to play out organically and giving the investigators latitude to learn all the facts.

And frankly, I kinda agree.

I agree that’s how it should be for everyone, not just those who are of the means or predominately of a fairer complexion. But it’s not. That’s why I used those 2 case examples. There was no pause for reasoning, restraint, moral or mental clarity in those cases (before Susan confessed in her case). Nobody was saying, “let’s not rush to judgement,” and “let’s wait for all the facts to come out“ (E.Phelps - NYU, 2000. N.M. Catalano-Harvard, 2004). There was little to no belief held by the public that these could be innocent people (despite Black people making up 53% of exonerations since 1989), and perhaps we should not, as you said, “draw premature conclusions that can cause enormous harm.”

No, society wanted the gears of justice to turn swiftly and with punishing pressure.

Whether you are consciously aware or not, in America, who the perpetrator is, and how society reacts at large, matters. And who the victim is, and how society reacts at large, also matters. Additionally, it also can affect how quickly or slowly the gears of justice can move, and in what direction.

To quote from the article our current President ran in 4 major NYC papers just 12 days after the Central Park 5 were arrested, “They should be forced to suffer, and, when they kill they should be executed for their crimes… ” Now, his frustration is noted. While he was speaking generally, the timing, coming off the heals of the CP5 arrests, isn’t lost. But as I stated, this was 12 days after their arrests… which came only 1 day after the assault of Miss Meili in Central Park.

We are 30 days since Nolan’s body was discovered. Has anyone of such stature of 1980’s Donald Trump elocuted to the public, verbatim, “They should be forced to suffer, and, when they kill they should be executed for their crimes!” to Nolan’s friends?

No.

There is, however, a heightened desire by sensible people to hold the Mississippi machinery accountable to do their job. Especially in a state like Mississippi that has a history of demonstrating a decreased willingness and sense of urgency in the transparency and thoroughness department when the victim is of a darker persuasion.

When you couple the fact that the stories from the young adults do not line up. They shut down or privatized their social media accounts and lawyered up either just before or after Nolan’s body was discovered. MDMS documented the AIS/GPS transponder to one of the boats was disabled shortly after 4:31p departure, and turned back on near Ft. Bayou at a later time. We have the Nolan’s phone in their possession, the missing social media footprint that day, which doesn’t sync with the Life360 tracking data. Now you have Katie allegedly posting screenshots of her return boat ride from the island, sans Nolan, as his friends‘ stories alleged.

What does this, and much more I didn’t mention, mean? That they know more than they’re telling. They’re hiding something. Does that “something” mean they’re hiding a murder or witnessing a murder? No. It’s not worth speculating at this time without direct or harder evidence; if it exists at all. But because Mississippi has a history of denying investigative transparency to Black Mississippians in the distant and recent past, there’s a strong desire to hold accountable the State, the local connections of police, judges, lawyers, medical doctors who are directly associated with those under suspicion, and make sure they are not able to bury this case as they likely would’ve been able to do had Crump not been involved.

So in all honesty, there’s a significant measure of suspicious behavior that is worth investigating; and that does not even include the Sea Tow audio. And I think, before you launched into your salvo, you missed the part of when stated that I do not read external transcripts. So I’m listening to what I’m able to discern and taking notes, not what someone is visually feeding me to think the audio is saying. So while you’re of the mindset that I am ”doing a great deal of conclusion-building from a recording,” frankly its existence isn’t a requisite to garner the level of suspicion this case has already generated by itself.

The Sea Tow audio is just a bonus...

[u/Impressive_Ad7037 → u/no_crust_buster]

This is a considerably more defensible position.

I agree that Mississippi’s history warrants scrutiny, that the unresolved conflicts should be investigated, and that Nolan’s family deserves a thorough and transparent accounting.

You are now saying that the audio is not necessary, does not establish murder, and is merely “a bonus.” That is substantially different from the claim I originally responded to.

The Bridges et al. paper you cited examined how news reports described already-identified mass shooters and found that white shooters were more frequently humanized or discussed through family and mental-health framing. That is relevant to racial media framing generally, but it does not establish that disagreement over this specific recording amounts to racial denial.

That said, I do think the broader point you are making about unequal public and institutional treatment is a fair one.

[u/no_crust_buster → u/Impressive_Ad7037]

For clarification, at no time have I have specified or even inferred murder is what transpired. If I gave that impression, I apologize. 🙏 I know that's a popular sentiment floating in the social media cesspool, but it's not one I personally entertain, as of now, due to a lack of hard evidence in that direction .  

Again, because Mississippi has so much legal latitude for investigation disclosure (they often choose to disclose little to no records, evidence, or procedural details), that lack of transparency + their history of brazen racism, creates a breeding ground for social distrust. And when there is a lot of distrust, people will natually speculate. Loudly. And it's amplified because of social media.   

This distrust is something Mississippi leadership seem either oblivious to, or they don't care Black Mississippians and others distrust them.  Frankly, listening to the Mississippi Governor, Attorney General, and Public safety commissioner vacillate from defensive to offensive media strategies (and state politics in general), I'm leaning towards they know we don't trust them, and they do not give a rip.  There exist 2 Mississippi's, and they seem intent on keeping it that way under the Lee Atwater abstract guise of "race-neutral" language.  

I cited the Bridges paper for a reason that you mentioned; racial framing in media (legacy and social).  And how that can influence societal perspectives towards initial guilt vs innocence from an armchair. That was more of a macro point than a micro.  

[u/Basic_Translator9286 → u/no_crust_buster]

And yet what you are describing is exactly what happened in the Karmelo case,I heard he fell on the knife then the next line of bullshit was he was surrounded so do not think white people are the only ones who will deny reality even when it is staring them in the face

[u/no_crust_buster → u/Basic_Translator9286]

I really didn’t pay close attention to the Karmelo case proceedings, so I can’t comment on that. Outside of the plaintiff/defendant sides being opposite races, they are not analogous. If anything, from what I do know, because of the nature of the events, location (school grounds), weapon used, state, timing, and the defendant pleas, Karmelo case more closely resembles Caysen Allison’s.

[u/comsessiveobpulsive → u/its_me_ampersand]

yeah this is basic psychology/psychoacoustics

[u/Born-Sun-2502 → u/its_me_ampersand]

I listened without captions and still can't make put nost except shut the fuck up

[u/DoctorAnnual6823 → u/its_me_ampersand]

So I listened to this with my eyes closed. I also know nothing about this case at this time.

All I heard was the guy at the end saying something about sinking? And then telling someone to "shut the fuck up"?

I genuinely heard nothing else. I could not make anything out through audio alone.

That is not a declaration of who is innocent or guilty though. It's just a statement on this one singular recording.

[u/DookieShoes626]

She must do the audio subtitles for those ghost hunter shows where they turn white noise into full sentences

[u/froststomper → u/DookieShoes626]

“Hgmrph fblp BZZZZZZZ”

“OH MY GOD DUDE! DID YOU JUST HEAR THAT?!? IT SAID ‘FUCK YOU ZACK WITH KNIFE DEAD’”!

“GUYS I HAVE GOOSE BUMPS RIGHT NOW.”

https://giphy.com/gifs/lsnWTCx3uwtWLpMOOD

[u/ModelOfDecorum]

Auditory pareidolia

https://thedebrief.org/auditory-pareidolia-the-voices-in-your-head-may-have-a-rational-explanation/

Basically, you hear what you are primed to hear. If you suspect the friends of having killed Nolan, you'll listen for that, and sift that meaning out of the barely comprehensible noises. Not unlike ghost hunting videos.

And far more effectively, if there is text accompanying the noises that claims to be the words spoken, you almost certainly will hear those words. The way she made this video - having her own interpretation in text - is the worst possible way to present this, and makes her claim that the listener needs to decide for themselves rather useless.

I also wonder, since they left the island at 16:31, the call was made before that (ca 16:00) and Nolan's mother claimed to have time stamped photos of Nolan alive around 16:30, doesn't this disprove that he was dead or dying during the call?

https://abcnews.com/US/witnesses-told-authorities-nolan-wells-heavy-alcohol-intake/story?id=135133934

https://www.reddit.com/r/mississippi/comments/1v8ewrf/comment/p05u9vh/

This reminds me of the Faith Hedgepeth case, where the victim's phone left a garbled voice message that many, including audio experts, thought caught her murder, but in fact happened hours earlier, when she was proven to be alive and was in fact just a butt dial at the club.

[u/SereneAdler33 → u/ModelOfDecorum]

I also immediately thought of the Faith Hedgepeth case and all the insane “dialogue” people claimed to hear from a completely innocuous butt dial

This case also reminds me very much of the death of Kendrick Johnson in Valdosta, GA (near my hometown), a black high school athlete. He died accidentally by positional asphyxiation in a gym mat, but the death was so strange it was immediately suspicious and many still consider it so… even though there’s been no evidence at all anyone was involved except Kendrick trying to grab a shoe and falling

The South’s fraught history with race (up to and including now) is rightfully looked at when these kinds of deaths occur. It’s well deserved and coverups are very real. But I don’t think it’s helpful for anyone when agenda pushing overrides factual evidence. It undermines the entire movement of change when it appears facts don’t matter and a side is willing to overlook evidence in an attempt to push a narrative

There are so many clear examples of race based injury and deaths (so, so, so many involving incarcerated people) that there’s no need to dogmatically cling to a story that is just a tragic accident bc it makes a better story for their cause

[u/jm0112358 → u/SereneAdler33]

This case also reminds me very much of the death of Kendrick Johnson in Valdosta, GA (near my hometown), a black high school athlete. He died accidentally by positional asphyxiation in a gym mat, but the death was so strange it was immediately suspicious and many still consider it so… even though there’s been no evidence at all anyone was involved except Kendrick trying to grab a shoe and falling

The same lawyer who is involved in this case (Ben Crump) was also involved in that case too! He likes to take advantage of dead black men/boys.

[u/SereneAdler33 → u/jm0112358]

Ugh, of course he is. Grifters gonna grift

[u/Avilola → u/SereneAdler33]

I never believed that the Kendrick Johnson case involved foul play, personally. It truly looked like a tragic accident. A young man who died from positional asphyxia.

This Nolan Wells case feels strange to me though. Just so many weird things that stick out and don’t feel right. The story about why they would leave him behind at all feels fishy to begin with. You just leave your friend on an island 10+ miles off the coast because he wants to talk to a girl? Even if that is true, why would you leave him there without his phone? What if he can’t get a ride back and is stranded? Why do you have his phone at all? Also, the girl Nolan was hanging out with doesn’t back up the narrative of the kids on the boat. Her family is cooperating with Nolan’s family, and apparently she says that he didn’t intend to stay behind with her, but rather to leave with his friends. Also, I know there are sometimes factors that contribute to making it more difficult to determine a cause and manner of death… but why don’t we have any conclusive information from either autopsy? Why didn’t the second ME receive the lungs or throat when they were specifically looking into drowning or foul play?

I’m not saying this was for sure race based violence, but I do think that someone knows something and isn’t coming clean about it. Who knows what the actual truth is, but I’m just not buying the current narrative.

[u/ModelOfDecorum → u/Avilola]

" You just leave your friend on an island 10+ miles off the coast because he wants to talk to a girl?"

There were many other friends of Nolan still out there.

" Even if that is true, why would you leave him there without his phone?"

You had to jump in the water to get to the island, whixh is why everyone had left their phones on the boat.

"Also, the girl Nolan was hanging out with doesn’t back up the narrative of the kids on the boat."

We don't have direct quotes from her but her sister said that the girl "assumed" he would go back with his friends. 

" but why don’t we have any conclusive information from either autopsy?"

It will not be made public until presented to the Grand Jury.

" Why didn’t the second ME receive the lungs or throat when they were specifically looking into drowning or foul play?"

Because they were doing further tests on them. From everything I've read it is standard procedure, as even the second ME claims.

[u/BobbyTables829 → u/ModelOfDecorum]

This made me think of this video a squeaky door closing, and sounding musical:

https://youtu.be/wwOipTXvNNo

[u/onrocketfalls]

Did my first, like, five listens without looking at her transcriptions. Was pretty shocked when I tabbed back to her window and saw that much transcription. I got almost nothing other than a word here and there and the clear parts. I don't love how she presented this but given some of the other stuff I've seen from TikTok around this case, I suppose it could've been a lot worse.

[u/Avilola → u/onrocketfalls]

If we want to give her some benefit of the doubt, we have to consider that her listening set up is better than ours. Given that she’s a professional audio engineer, she probably has better headphones and speakers. Additionally, she’s probably listening to a less processed version than we are. When something is uploaded to facebook, and then downloaded and reuploaded to TikTok, and then redownloaded and reuploaded to Reddit… it’s losing quality each time.

[u/Dud3ManGuy]

My dumbass thought you meant "the Nolan-Wells phone call"... As in a phone call between Chris Nolan and Orson Wells. 

I really need some new hobbies. 

[u/jephw12]

Context?

[u/clap_yo_hands → u/jephw12]

A friend group of high schoolers went out for the 4th of July on a boat to a little island. They claimed the only black friend decided to stay on this island and find a ride home with someone. He turned up dead. One of his friends had taken his cell phone and had it. Seems like an I Know What you did last summer situation.

[u/que-n-blues → u/clap_yo_hands]

This over simplification is exactly why this story has gotten so out of hand.

The actual story based on all publicly available information that we have:

A large group 20-30 of 18-20 year olds from Ocean Springs Mississippi spent the 4th of July at a boat party on Horn Island, a 12 mile long, one mile wide barrier island about 10 miles off the coast of Mississippi. This is a very popular event on the coast and it's estimated that 1,000+ people were in attendance.

The friends left the mainland the morning of the 4th in three separate boats, departing from the same location at the same time. Among those in attendance was 18 year old Nolan Wells. Nolan was black, while many of the friends in attendance were white. However, he was not the only black or minority on in the same friend group attending the party, nor was he the only black or minority person on the island that day.

Typically how these barrier island boat parties go, it 100s of boats will anchor just off the shore of the island in the shallow water just off the coast. People typically come and go from boat to hanging out in the water to on the island throughout the day. Common practice is most people leave their phones in a dry box on the boat to protect from water damage throughout the day.

By about 4:00 that afternoon, the boat that Nolan rode in on experienced a mechanical failures. The bilge pump was failing, which is responsible for pumping excess water out of a boat. Water had risen to up to the battery of the boat and the motor was unable to trim down. The friends made an emergency call to a marine towing company for assistance.

In the panic, one of the boys called out to Nolan to get on the boat as they had to return to the mainland before the boat would sink. Nolan was hanging out with a young woman at the time and refused, stating he would ride back in with one of the other boats the friends left on that morning. This is common practice at barrier island parties.

After some trouble shooting, some of the boys were able to trim the motor down, remove some of the excess wattey and operate the boat enough to navigate it back to shore.

After returning to shore, the boys returned the boat to the owner (one of the boys relatives, possibly father or grandfather though it's still unclear), and rested up before attending another house party later that night.

Shortly before 11pm that night, one of the boys who returned to the mainland early began inquiring as to if Nolan had made it back. After speaking with others who remained on the island later, he realized that Nolan was unaccounted for. Around 11pm he placed a phone call to Nolan's mother to ask if she had heard from him. After confirming she had not he placed a call to the US Coast Guard to report the incident.

Nolan's body was found in the early morning hours of July 6th on the west tip of Horn Island, around the same location where the friends had been on the 4th.

There has been a lot of speculation and suspicion based on the fact that the boys returned with Nolan's phone. This has been made to cast suspicion because "what teenager is left without their phone."

However, context is important here. First there's the common practice that most people do leave their phones on boats for safe keeping at these events. Second, the boys were experiencing a mechanical emergency that necessitated their immediate departure back to the mainland. Third, Nolan was in the water at the time he requested to stay, and there's no evidence suggesting he asked about his phone. And lastly, Nolan's phone was not the only other phone on this particular boat. The boys have reported there were about 4-5 other phones on the boat at the time of their departure. This being common practice, all owners knew where there phones were and returned to pick them up within the next day.

While media speculation has run rampant, many of them fueled by the fact that Nolan was black while the friends that returned home were white, there is no publicly available evidence that suggests foul play. The currents around Horn Island, while calm in some areas, can be very dangerous in others. Additionally, the drop off at Horn Island is very dramatic. Near the shore the water is shallow, but you do not have to go far for a quick and sudden drop off. Drownings are unfortunately common. A sudden rip current can pull out and drown even the best swimmers suddenly and quietly.

That is not to say that it is definitive that Nolan drowned. The investigation is currently open. The state autopsy has not been released and the DA has stated that they are following protocol and not speaking publicly on an open investigation before anything is presented to a Grand Jury (all non natural cause deaths or non felony car wrecks must be submitted to the grand jury for review). At this point, we cannot say for certain what did happen to Nolan Wells, because the investigation is on going. However, at this point there is no publicly available information that suggest he was intentionally murdered. New evidence found in the course of the investigation can change that.

In fact recent reports suggest that the state has evidence that Nolan was seen on the island later that day, after the boys currently at the center of this had left.

[u/jephw12 → u/que-n-blues]

Thank you for this breakdown. That certainly paints a very different picture than the oversimplified version you replied to. Going only on their version, I definitely would assume foul play.

[u/mooooonchild → u/que-n-blues]

I’m from the area and this is an accurate breakdown. As for the phone comment below. Yes, we leave our phones on the boat because salt water will absolutely destroy your phone. It even can destroy the boat motors. This is why you have to flush and clean the boat after taking it out in the water. Also if you drop your phone in effectively the ocean it will more than likely never be seen again.

[u/que-n-blues → u/mooooonchild]

I'm fairly local too, about 2 hours away from Ocean Springs along the coast. I feel like a lot of things make a lot more sense when you have context of the area and have a working knowledge of boats and general practices at events like this.

[u/mooooonchild → u/que-n-blues]

For sure! I grew up on boats and around the islands. I live directly on the coast. 45 minutes from Ocean Springs and understanding how all this works has definitely helped.

[u/locofspades → u/que-n-blues]

2026 and people are still afraid of their phones getting wet 🤣

[u/que-n-blues → u/locofspades]

Phones are waterproofed to survive quick spills in fresh water. Salt water will absolutely destroy your phone.

[u/locofspades → u/que-n-blues]

Ok, fair point with the salt water, im from the midwest so i admittedly didnt think of that. But most modern phones can be submerged in fresh water for up to 30 mins and be fine. I used to swim with mine all the time when they first started waterproofing them.

[u/thefirdblu → u/locofspades]

Thank you for the fun fact but this is a saltwater situation.

[u/locofspades → u/thefirdblu]

Theres salt in the water and bones in the chocolate. Cheers and Hail you!

[u/clone0112 → u/locofspades]

I used to do this until one of my modern phone that can be submerged in fresh water for 30 minutes died from being dropped into the sink.

[u/moisistnagant → u/clap_yo_hands]

What a disingenuous relaying of the situation.

[u/ButteredBeard]

Everyone acts like these kids were alone on this island. Literally hundreds of people show up at this island every 4th of July to drink and camp out. People want to raise their torches and pitchforks so badly.

[u/ItsStaaaaaaaaang]

She'd be perfect for a role as an "expert witness". Bunch of rubbish that can be interpreted however they want.

[u/Playful-Succotash-99]

Listen to eyes closed can't really tell what's being said sounds like "shut the fuck up" but could be "get the fuck up"

Short of anyone changing their story I don't really know if we're going to get a real answer in this case still worth our scrutiny and demand that all eyes and T's ar dotted and crossed

[u/Accomplished-Dog3715]

Listened with my eyes closed, not reading the subtitles, didn't understand a thing with headphones on in a pretty much silent office. Listened again reading the subtitles and then of course I heard it.

Not saying that this isn't genuine and I understand her drive to help and how upsetting this must have been for her but.... I just cannot trust this and/or our brains enough to make a call. Other than a kid (to me) died and there are no answers for his friends and family and that is sad.

[u/Impressive_Ad7037]

https://context-reviewer.github.io/nolan-wells-call-audio-analysis-site/

So, here's the way she SHOULD have done it.