Law&Crime Sidebar - Teen Nolan Wells' Mysterious Death — Everything We Know

Episode Date: July 7, 2026

A July 4th boat trip to Horn Island, Mississippi turned tragic after 18-year-old student-athlete Nolan Wells went missing. A body believed to be his was later discovered. Investigators are now searching for answers regarding what happened out on the water and why the young wide receiver never returned to shore with his friends. Law&Crime's Jesse Weber breaks down the details of this devastating death investigation alongside Brian Trascher, the vice president of the United Cajun Navy, who actively participated in the search.GoFundMe: https://gofund.me/155135f07PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Level up your business with a free 14-day trial of Odoo by visiting https://odoo.com/sidebar. HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger, Christina O'Shea, Alex Ciccarone, & Jay CruzScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson & Juliana BattagliaGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrimeTwitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

A Mississippi family is trying to cope with a heartbreaking update from volunteers searching for a missing teen. Searchers believe they found the body of 18-year-old Nolan Xavier Wells after he headed out on a boat trip with friends for July 4th and never came back. What happened out there on the water? Why was Nolan the only member of his friend group who didn't return to shore? And what is next in the search for answers? I'm going to be speaking with one of the members of the United Cajun Navy who was out there actively searching when the devastating news came in. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by law and crime. I'm Jesse Weber.

July 4th, Independence Day. It's a holiday that a lot of people spend out in the water all across the United States. From beach days along the Atlantic to boat days on the lake, it's supposed to be just a great way to spend a hot summer day. But the water, as we know, also carries a lot of dangers. And this small aisle called Horn Island has now become the center of a death investigation. So Horn Island is a long, thin, barrier island south of Pascagoula, Mississippi. It's part of the Gulf Coast. It's only accessible by boat.

This is according to the National Park Service, so limited accessibility, right? Now, according to family members and the Jackson County Mississippi Sheriff's Office, 18-year-old Nolan Wells went to Horn Island with several friends on Saturday. This young, fit, wide receiver for the Southwest Mississippi Community College Football Team was last seen at around 3 p.m. that day. New York Post reported that he was, quote, talking to a girl on the north end of Horn Island. When he was reported missing, multiple agencies jumped into action.

The United Cajun Navy, their incident commander, Josh Gill, posted about the search on Facebook over the weekend. About 6.180 pounds was last seen on that north end of Horn Island. Guys, he hasn't been found. He was last talking to a girl on that north end. He went out to Horn Island with some buddies yesterday out on a boat. He's not been heard from in close to 24 hours. So guys, if you're out there fishing, if you're out there, you know, jet skiing, do whatever you guys are doing, Keep your eyes out from Nolan.

Now, I'm going to be speaking with the Cajun Navy's vice president, Brian Trasher, in just a moment. I want to get a better sense of what the search was like because he was actively searching for Nolan when it's believed Nolan's body was found. Nolan's mom, Christine, got a hold of these photos that Nolan had apparently taken with friends aboard a boat the day that he went missing. She flooded social media with these photos asking for anyone with information to get in touch with authorities. And it's unclear so far what Nolan's friends told law enforcement, told authorities when they reported they couldn't find him. But according to the sheriff's office, it was a park ranger that spotted a body at around 8.45 a.m. Monday morning. Authorities haven't officially released an identity. They're apparently still waiting for DNA test results.

But media outlet WAPT and Jackson reported that the coroner said there's no reason to believe it's not known. According to TMZ, the body was in the water near the northwest end of the island. WAPT also reports that an autopsy is planned for today, Tuesday, and we can learn a lot more once those results are released, but that could potentially be weeks from now. In the meantime, his family is just trying to come to grips with the fact that this happened, that this young man, a college sophomore known for showing off his skills in the football field with his whole life ahead of him is now dead, died during what was just supposed to be a day out on the water. And Christine confirmed this heartbreaking development in a Facebook post.

I want to thank our family, friends, community, United Cajun Navy, local law enforcement, and everyone involved for all the love, support, resources over the last few days. His father, our family, friends and I are absolutely devastated, heartbroken for my sweet son, was always willing to cheer and uplift others. Nolan was a special soul. God took his time creating our son. I ask that you please give me and my family time to grief. Southwest Mississippi Community College's president also released a statement saying, quote, the entire Southwest family is heartbroken as we mourn the tragic loss of Nolan Wells. Nolan was an exemplary student, athlete, friend, and teammate. We remember Nolan as a well-respected young man who was very popular

among friends, faculty, and staff. We love Nolan, and he will be greatly missed in many ways. Our continued prayers will be with the Wells family now and in the days to come. At first, Christine had put out this message on Facebook saying that no go-fund me had been set up yet and that any pages that were set up, it was a scam. Unfortunately, we've seen this before in other cases, someone taking advantage of what is already a tragic situation. But since then, a friend, did set up an official fundraiser. We're going to put a link to it in the episode notes if you want to contribute, donate, support in some way. And according to the GoFundMe page, quote, funds raised will be used for funeral and memorial expenses, celebration of life services, and any additional

costs associated with honoring Nolan's memory. Any remaining funds will help support the family as they navigate the difficult days ahead. How do we get here? What went wrong? What led to a young man losing his life. When Nolan disappeared, a lot of people jumped in to help with the search, including what's called the United Cajun Navy. Hey, let me say something real quick. Look, running a business, that's tough enough. But why make it harder doing things manually relying on dozens of apps that don't really talk to each other? Well, that's where our sponsor, Odu, comes in. So Odo is an all-in-one business management platform with a full suite of integrated apps that seamlessly connect all your operations from sales and accounting to manufacturing

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next level by consulting with an Odoo expert today for free at odoo.com slash sidebar. When Nolan disappeared, a lot of people jumped in to help with the search, including what is called the United Cajun Navy. I want to welcome in Brian Trasher, Vice President of the Cajun Navy. part of this weekend search that, as we just talked about, came to such a tragic conclusion. Brian, thanks so much for coming on. I'm so sorry. You know, I know you're part of a lot of searches. And when something like this results, you know, it's one thing for it to be incredibly

difficult for the family and friends of Nolan, but I imagine for you as well, this is a tough time. And my understanding is that you were actually in the air above the island when the call came in that a body had been found? That's correct. Yeah, on Sunday, the 5th of July, we had a rescue specialist and a drone operator go out on a boat. And they spent several hours out there on the island and around the island. And they were not successful in finding any clues. So that's what we decided to do era reconnaissance.

So Monday morning, yesterday morning at first light, I went up in a single engine, a fixed wing aircraft and flew basically a grid around. Horn Island Ship Island, which are Barrier Islands, just south of Biloxi and Pascagoula, Mississippi, down to Chandelier Islands, which is actually part of Louisiana, but just due south of those barrier islands and looking for any kind of activity. And then, yeah, as we flew over the northwest tip of Horn Island going back north, we noticed there was a couple of boats beached up on the beach that were not there before. And I could look down and I could see that something was going on and then we made a circle around by that time a lot more law enforcement boats were showing up and before you know what they had, you know, probably a dozen boats huddled up on the beach there.

So we knew that they were setting up a command center. What was this search effort like? I mean, I know that there was multiple people involved in it. What was it like from the start of it? And how quickly did you mobilize to provide support? So I think we got the first call on the evening of the 4th of July when it was starting to, you know, get dark and Nolan still nobody had heard from him and he wasn't home. And then I believe that the next morning on the fifth,

I think somebody took his mother out on a boat back to the island to look around. And that's when we started calling some of our volunteers from our Mississippi chapter and mobilized a couple of volunteers, like I said, in a boat and went out there and started searching. On the official side, you had, I think the Jackson County Sheriff's Office, You had the Mississippi or the Marine Patrol. I'm not sure if they're a county or a state agency. And then the Horn Island's part of the National Golf Park Island Seashore, I think is what it's called. And they have park rangers who do a great job keeping a lot of recreational boaters and swimmers and stuff safe.

And it was one of those rangers that actually ended up discovering Nolan's remains yesterday morning about 845 Central. I want to talk about that in a minute because I have some questions. about the potential remains here. Yeah. First of all, what resources do the United Cajun Navy provide that traditional law enforcement or other agencies just don't have? I mean, what role do you play? I mean, it's interesting, we've talked about it,

about how they maybe should be allowed to assist in the Nancy Guthrie investigation, but just generally speaking, what kind of resources do you provide? We have a lot of the same type of resources that state and local law enforcement agencies have when it comes to, you know, boats, aircraft, canine dogs, drones. The difference is, is that we can usually deploy them a lot faster. And that's usually only because we don't have

as many sort of protocols and permissions, I'll say, to go through, to make that call and to put the resources out there. Fortunately, because of the system where we have chapters in every state, we keep an active database of special skilled volunteers that are usually at the ready. And we can deploy them pretty quickly. And it's not that we replace those agencies, but we're a force multiplier. And a lot of times it's easier for, say, a sheriff or a mayor or somebody to say, hey, I'm getting my guys together. We're going through all our paperwork or whatever. But like you guys go.

You guys go do what you do and let us know if you find something. And that's typically how it happens. That's typically how the relationship works. This body that was found, do you have any idea the condition of, the body, the status of the body, because when we hear that they need to do some more forensic testing, DNA testing, to confirm the identity, is that standard operating procedure, or was the body in such a condition from what you know that you couldn't make a readily identifiable, you know, whether it was Nolan or not, you can't make a clear identification just by looking

at the remains? Yeah, the, I saw the body from about 300 feet in the air, but, So I wouldn't be able to tell you like the exact condition. I can tell you that it did not, it did not appear to be waterlog. It was only in the water for a couple days. But nevertheless, the sheriff's office put out a statement saying that they had no reason to believe it was not Nolan. So I think they were pretty confident it was. I think the reason for the delay in the official announcement is that I don't think the coroner can sign the death certificate until he gets DNA evidence proving it is who they're, you know, the person they're saying. is deceased, you know, is actually them. So I think it's just a, I think it's just a formality,

to be honest with you. But I believe that the family or somebody in the family did identify Nolan and they put out their own statement, acknowledging that it was his remains that were found and that he had in fact, and he had in fact died. Just to clarify something, why wasn't the body spotted earlier? I think that the, well, I can tell you that I, I've started flying over the island, that part of the island where the body washed up, approximately 6.30 a.m. And I believe he was spotted by a park ranger at 845. My belief is that he just washed up within that time period because we were flying kind of a long grid north and south.

And I think he just washed up and park ranger just doing his normal runs in the morning. But also, too, given the situation, I'm sure they were a little more hyper-aware and probably a little more head on a swivel on the island knowing what happened and what was going on. But yeah, I was told that it was about 845 when a ranger spotted called it in because I did see a long line of emergency boats coming in to coming north, I'm sorry, heading southwest toward the northwest tip of the island. And I thought it was just originally I thought it was just another search party going out, but I think they were actually responding to that call. By the way, can we clarify the timeline a little bit?

So did Nolan's friends report him missing while they were still at Horn Island or did they have to come back? I mean, how long was he allegedly gone before authorities were notified? So the story which was told to me was that at approximately 3 p.m., his friend group that he had gone to the island with decided they were going to leave. They had to get back. and the he Nolan had had started talking to I was told it was a young female but he was talking to some other people had decided that hey I'm going to hang back I can get a ride back with somebody else he he hangs out with this group all the time they've been to this island together a bunch of times it probably at the time didn't seem like a big deal to his friends to say okay you want to you know go go holler at that girl and

If she'll give you a ride back, then that's cool. You know, we'll see you when we get home. That's the way it was explained to me. Later on, when it got to be, you know, after dark and nobody had heard from him, but they also at some somehow or another, his phone ended up staying on the boat that he, his friends were on. So they had his phone. So they brought it back to his mother.

So he had no way of communicating unless he borrowed somebody's phone. But nevertheless, the sequence of events that transpired after approximately, 3 p.m. to when he went into the water, that's, that's what remains a mystery. There might, the police might know, I'm sure they know a lot more detail than I do, that that's just how much has been told to me so far. Based on your experience, do you have a theory as to what may have happened here? Yeah, I think that he either tried to swim out for some reason, either to try to get on a boat or to go, you know, catch up with somebody or whatnot. And there was a pretty strong rip coming off that part of the island that day.

And even though he's a really athletic kid, it was a strong rip, but it would have been hard for anybody to maintain control. Anybody got carried out. And he may have drowned that way. Or, and again, I hate to even suggest anything that sounds like a conspiracy theory, but I'm just saying it's a possibility that he got on another boat and maybe M-O-B and drown that way and then wash back up. He did not, my opinion is that he, when he went into the water, however he got into the water,

he didn't go that far out before he drowned because of, it only took like a couple of days for him to drift right back south to the tip of the island, same tip of the island where he was last seen. Had he gone a lot further out, he probably would have gotten sucked into the ship channel and pushed way further south toward the Chandelier Islands. And to be clear, I mean, nobody has indicated foul play, right? I mean, that could change, but you haven't heard anything to suggest foul play. Nobody except the Facebook detectives.

It is interesting when you look at some of the photos. I don't see a life vest or anything like that. Is that something that stood out to you? A life vest on it. You mean like when they were on the boat? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, so if I'm not mistaken, state law says that if you're 14 years or older, you don't have to physically wear a life vest on a boat.

You do have to have it out. You have to have it available and out to where you can easily access it. But there's at their age, at 18 years old, there's no law that says they're required to wear a PFD while on a boat. In the pictures that I saw, I'm not even sure if the boat was moving, and if the boat's at anchor, there's definitely no law that says you have to have a PFD on it. What was the weather like? Did that play a factor, you think? I think that the only thing about the weather that's of note is that it was extremely hot and the UV index was really high.

So if those guys weren't drinking a lot of water, you know, it could have been dehydrated, you know, just, you know, possible sunstroke. could have just sort of, I mean, the sun can drain energy out of you. So even though, like I said, he was young and athletic, by the time he got into the water, he might have been in a weekend state and didn't even know it. Can you just talk to us a little bit more about Horn Island, what we should know about it? Because I understand it's not very big. There aren't any buildings or anything like that.

But it seems like a really popular destination, but it's limited accessibility. That's correct. So Horn Island, like I said, it's probably about 10, 12 miles off the coast of it stretches probably from about the south of the city of Biloxi to the city of Pascagoula, which borders Harrison and Jackson counties on Mississippi Gulf Coast. It's a very popular recreational destination. It is uninhabited. There's some very pretty beaches, you know, when it's not too windy, the water's pretty clear. The water was, the temperature was in the high 70s. It's 4th of July. Obviously, it's a crowded day, everybody out. But yeah, the only way to get there is to buy boat or, you know, maybe like,

presumably like an aircraft or something, but for the most part, people go out there by boat and just leisurely hang out in the water and have fun. Same thing with Ship Island. Ship Island is just to the west. And that island has a historic fort, Fort Massachusetts. It's been there since 1861. Another popular place for people to hang out. All the barrier islands along Mississippi on the weekend, you see just a lot of boats. You know, it's sort of like the outer banks of the Carolina.

It's just a popular recreational destination. Are you still a part of this in any way, this investigation? Are you in contact with law enforcement? Are you contact with the family? Is there any information that you're going to be getting as this progresses? Because even an autopsy can take some time before the results are released. And I'm just curious what information you might be having access to. Yeah, we're not part of the investigation.

You know, we're not policemen. We're not journalists. We are strictly brought in because we're really good at finding people that are missing. And that's sort of our role, once. It was radioed up to me in the plane that there was a recovery. We did a couple of circles just looking at the TOC that they were setting up there on the beach, and then we just returned to base. And my team was already en route to the, I think it was the Mars Lake boat launch in person,

in Ocean Springs, Mississippi, where they had kind of the law enforcement intercepted staging areas where Nolan's family was. And, you know, our guys were out there with his mother, just trying to comfort her. But as far as, like, you know, any kind of inside investigation, you know, information about the investigation, you know, unless that's voluntarily offered by law enforcement, which I doubt that that's not something that we're going to know. If there was anything they, you know, wanted to interview us about or just, you know, share any information that we had, we'd be happy to. but again, we're not police officers. We're not professional investigators. Well, first of all, let me just say this.

Brian, you and your team are amazing. You do incredible work. I know that we've covered the work of the United Cajun Navy and other cases, and I'm always just amazed at what you can bring to this. So thank you for your help in this situation. Thank you for the help that you and your organization do on so many different cases. And I just have to say, this is such a tragedy. My heart really goes out to the family here as they're trying to.

to process what happened. I want to stay on top of this. I want to know what happened. I know this family has a lot of questions that need answers. But listen, thank you for coming on. Again, I'm sorry that you were a part of this. I'm sorry that this is the end result. But again, we're still waiting for 100% identification. But thank you, Brian, for coming on and talking a little bit more about it. Yeah, thanks for having me. And for anybody, you know, your viewers, just we need to try to keep the chatter and the conspiracy theories to a minimum. Yeah, we do need to find out what happened to Nolan from three o'clock until he was last seen. His family has a right to know exactly what happened and how he met his final moments. But there's his friends who he's been friends

with since he was a little kid are getting death threats from people who are accusing him of horrible things. And right now we just don't we don't know anything. We have to let law enforcement do their job and come out with the facts. And that's what we're asking the public to do. Well said. All right. Let's see what happens. Brian Trasher. Thank you. Thanks, ma'am. And that's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar. Everybody, thank you so much for joining us. And as always, please subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you should get your podcast. You can also check us out on NBC's Peacock as well. If you want to follow me, X, Instagram, my News Nation show, Jesse Weber Live, Monday through Friday, 11 p.m. Eastern. See you next time.