Nolan wells’ mother used a tracking app to find her son’s phone after he went missing on July 4. Now she refuses to turn the phone over to investigators.
Nolan Wells, 18, was found dead near Horn Island, Mississippi, 2 days after celebrating the fourth of July with friends.
Nolan’s mom, Christine Wells-Wonsley, used the Life360 app to locate her son’s phone at a friend’s house.
The Jackson County District Attorney’s Office gave Wonsley 48 hours to turn over her son’s phone to investigators.
At first, the family’s attorneys pushed back on the DA’s demand for the phone. The family’s legal team doesn’t want the phone to leave their possession. So, they are asking the DA’s office to choose a time and date this week for the examination.
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump previously announced that the family agreed to examine the phone together with law enforcement.
In a letter to Jackson County District Attorney Angel Myers McIlrath, obtained by Atlanta Black Star, the legal team says her office can choose any time between Tuesday, August 18, and Friday, August 21, to examine the phone with them.
“Please provide at least a 12-hour notice of your chosen date and time so that the examination can be scheduled without further delay,” the family’s local attorney, Ahmad R. Smith, said in the letter.
The family defended keeping the phone even though it might be helpful in the investigation.
“We have been – and remain – ready and willing to cooperate in arranging a joint forensic inspection of Nolan Wells’ personal cell phone,” Smith wrote.
“Our position has not changed. We are prepared to coordinate a mutually agreeable date and procedure for the examination of the phone.”
Smith said the examination would be conducted through the Digital Forensics Lab at the Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College. The FBI could also conduct their own examination of the phone at the college.
Tyler Cox, an attorney representing Wells’ friends who last saw him alive, said the family is not cooperating with law enforcement.
But Smith disputed the allegations. “We want to make clear that this is not the case,” Smith wrote.