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Shocking Autopsy Twist in Nolan Wells Mystery Death · Murder Files Unsealed

0:00
Speaker 1: So I want you to just imagine the most agonizing
0:05
Speaker 1: weight of your entire life. Right.
0:07
Speaker 2: It's unimaginable.
0:08
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, you are a parent and you have
0:11
Speaker 1: just lost your child under these completely mysterious, just baffling circumstances.
0:16
Speaker 1: And for days, you know, you've been living in this
0:18
Speaker 1: nightmare of the unknown, just waiting for the official word
0:21
Speaker 1: from the authorities to kind of give you some answers.
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Speaker 3: Which is all any family wants in that situation, really.
0:26
Speaker 2: Exactly.
0:27
Speaker 1: Yeah. And finally, after fighting tooth and nail and spending
0:30
Speaker 1: your own money demanding a second look, you finally receive
0:34
Speaker 1: this independent autopsy report.
0:36
Speaker 2: The second opinion.
0:37
Speaker 1: Right. You open it up, hoping for that moment of clarity,
0:41
Speaker 1: that terrible but, you know, necessary closure. And instead, you
0:46
Speaker 1: realize that crucial pieces of the puzzle, like literally physical
0:50
Speaker 1: pieces of your child's anatomy, are just missing.
0:54
Speaker 3: Yeah, it is the absolute definition of a waking nightmare.
0:57
Speaker 3: I mean, when families are in that position, they really
0:59
Speaker 3: look to forensic science to provide a definitive answer. Right.
1:04
Speaker 1: They want certainty.
1:06
Speaker 2: Exactly.
1:06
Speaker 3: They want this neat binary resolution to tell them exactly
1:10
Speaker 3: how the story ended. But instead, they are handed a void.
1:14
Speaker 3: It's just a massive, terrifying question mark right where the
1:17
Speaker 3: science should be.
1:18
Speaker 1: And that is exactly the reality we are stepping into
1:21
Speaker 1: on this deep dive today. We are looking at the
1:24
Speaker 1: incredibly tragic and honestly highly volatile case of 18-year-old Nolan
1:30
Speaker 1: Xavier Wells.
1:31
Speaker 2: Just a heartbreaking situation all around.
1:33
Speaker 1: It really is. I mean, he was a college student.
1:36
Speaker 1: He was a dedicated football player. And on July 4th,
1:39
Speaker 1: he vanished from a remote island, only to be found
1:43
Speaker 1: dead days later. Yeah. So our mission today is to
1:47
Speaker 1: cut through all the public noise, all the social media
1:49
Speaker 1: speculation that and painstakingly unpack the shocking preliminary findings of
1:55
Speaker 1: the second independent autopsy that his family actually commissioned.
1:59
Speaker 2: Which is where things get really complicated.
2:02
Speaker 1: Right. We're going to be exploring the medical terminology, the
2:06
Speaker 1: glaring discrepancies in the narrative of how he was found,
2:10
Speaker 1: and the intense procedural friction between the family's independent experts
2:15
Speaker 1: and the state's investigators.
2:17
Speaker 3: And just to set the parameters for you, the listener,
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Speaker 3: We are anchoring this discussion strictly in the facts that
2:23
Speaker 3: have recently been brought to light in the official documentation.
2:25
Speaker 2: And public statements.
2:27
Speaker 1: No rumors, just the sources.
2:29
Speaker 2: Exactly.
2:29
Speaker 3: We are analyzing the updates from the family's representative, Attorney
2:32
Speaker 3: Ben Crump. We are examining the expert insights provided by
2:36
Speaker 3: Richland County Coroner Dr. Na Rutherford, who has been reviewing
2:40
Speaker 3: this case from an outside professional perspective.
2:42
Speaker 1: Right.
2:43
Speaker 3: And most importantly, we are looking at the raw anatomical
2:46
Speaker 3: data or, well, in this specific case, the lack of data.
2:50
Speaker 3: presented by the independent pathologist, Dr.
2:52
Speaker 2: Roger Mitchell.
2:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, because the environment surrounding this case is just highly
2:56
Speaker 1: pressurized right now. The temperature has escalated so rapidly, it
3:00
Speaker 1: is really hard to overstate.
3:02
Speaker 2: It's basically a powder keg.
3:04
Speaker 1: It really is. I mean, when Nolan's life was honored recently,
3:07
Speaker 1: it wasn't just some quiet family gathering. It was a massive,
3:11
Speaker 1: highly publicized service. Reverend Al Sharpton delivered the eulogy, and
3:15
Speaker 1: Tyler Perry actually stepped in to cover all the funeral costs.
3:18
Speaker 2: Which just shows you the level of national attention this
3:20
Speaker 2: is getting.
3:21
Speaker 1: Definitely. But before that service even ended, Reverend Sharpton did
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Speaker 1: something that immediately grabbed the nation's attention. He put up
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Speaker 1: a $ 50, 000 reward for information leading to a conviction.
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Speaker 2: A conviction.
3:33
Speaker 3: Now, that is a highly specific, legally binding condition.
3:37
Speaker 1: Right.
3:37
Speaker 3: I mean, a conviction implies that a crime definitely took place,
3:40
Speaker 3: a perpetrator is identified, tried, and found guilty by a
3:43
Speaker 3: jury of their peers. But, you know, at this point,
3:45
Speaker 3: In the timeline, a crime hasn't even been officially established
3:48
Speaker 3: by the local state investigators.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, and it didn't stop there. Tyler Perry then immediately
3:54
Speaker 1: matched that $ 50, 000 on the spot, bringing it to $ 100, 000.
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Speaker 1: And then another individual, Terry Owens, contributed an additional $ 25, 000.
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Speaker 1: So suddenly, you have a staggering $ 125, 000 reward just sitting
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Speaker 1: on the table. That is a massive sum of money.
4:04
Speaker 3: It is.
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Speaker 1: And this intense spotlight has brought some really severe consequences.
4:15
Speaker 1: The FBI has officially stepped in to investigate threats tied
4:18
Speaker 1: to this case. Plus, there's this looming possibility that after
4:23
Speaker 1: the sheriff's office finishes their investigation, the district attorney might
4:26
Speaker 1: present this entire situation to a grand jury.
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Speaker 2: It is a.
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Speaker 3: Textbook example of an investigation operating inside a pressure cooker.
4:34
Speaker 3: I mean, the stakes are astronomically high right now.
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Speaker 1: Okay, let's unpack this reward thing for a second because
4:39
Speaker 1: I want to push back on the mechanics of that.
4:41
Speaker 2: Sure, go ahead.
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Speaker 1: We have a six-figure sum being casually dropped at a
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Speaker 1: funeral for a conviction.
4:47
Speaker 2: Right.
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Speaker 1: Doesn't setting the finish line at a conviction rather than
4:50
Speaker 1: just asking for information leading to an arrest or, you know,
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Speaker 1: a recovered timeline create a highly dangerous incentive structure?
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Speaker 2: Oh, absolutely.
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Speaker 1: Because if I know something, but I only get paid
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Speaker 1: if someone goes to prison... Aren't you essentially putting a
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Speaker 1: bounty on a guilty verdict? Like, couldn't that encourage people
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Speaker 1: to embellish or even fabricate testimony just to secure the payout?
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Speaker 2: That is a phenomenal observation.
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Speaker 3: I mean, it really cuts to the heart of why
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Speaker 3: these private high-dollar rewards are so deeply controversial in the
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Speaker 3: legal community.
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Speaker 1: Right, because of the bias.
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Speaker 2: Exactly.
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Speaker 3: When you offer money for information, you are casting a
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Speaker 3: wide net for clues. But when you offer money for
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Speaker 3: a conviction, you are fundamentally altering the psychological landscape of
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Speaker 3: any potential witness. you're introducing this massive financial bias.
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Speaker 1: Which a defense attorney would just destroy in court, right?
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Speaker 2: Oh, without a doubt.
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Speaker 3: Defense attorneys will tear into any witness who comes forward
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Speaker 3: under the banner of a conviction reward. They'll argue the
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Speaker 3: witness isn't motivated by the truth. They're motivated by a $ 125, 000
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Speaker 3: payday that only cashes out if they say exactly what
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Speaker 3: the prosecution needs them to say.
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Speaker 1: It almost feels like the spotlight and the money could
5:56
Speaker 1: muddy the waters rather than clear them. I mean, you
5:59
Speaker 1: have the FBI stepping in over threats. Which means the
6:02
Speaker 1: local community is totally inflamed.
6:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, the tensions are incredibly high.
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Speaker 1: So does this intense public pressure actually force accountability? Or
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Speaker 1: does it just create this vortex where local investigators rush
6:15
Speaker 1: to conclusions just to get the microphones out of their faces?
6:18
Speaker 3: Well, if we connect this to the bigger picture, this
6:20
Speaker 3: level of astronomical attention almost never happens in a vacuum.
6:24
Speaker 3: It usually stems from a fundamental foundational breakdown in public trust.
6:30
Speaker 1: Right. The family didn't trust the local process.
6:33
Speaker 2: Exactly.
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Speaker 3: The reason the family commissioned this independent autopsy in the
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Speaker 3: first place, actually moving Nolan's body out of the local
6:40
Speaker 3: jurisdiction and transporting it all the way to Washington, D.C.,
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Speaker 3: is because they felt the local authorities were just not
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Speaker 3: being transparent with them.
6:48
Speaker 1: Yeah.
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Speaker 3: When a community, and especially a grieving family, feels that
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Speaker 3: the official channels are either incompetent or worse, actively hiding something,
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Speaker 3: That vacuum of information is immediately filled by public outrage,
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Speaker 3: celebrity intervention, and these massive private rewards.
7:06
Speaker 1: Nature abhors a vacuum, basically.
7:08
Speaker 2: Precisely.
7:09
Speaker 3: The spotlight doesn't necessarily aid the delicate forensic science, but
7:14
Speaker 3: it absolutely forces a level of documentation that might otherwise
7:18
Speaker 3: just be swept under the rug. The family felt they
7:21
Speaker 3: had to go to D.C. to get an unvarnished look
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Speaker 3: at the physical facts of their son's death.
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Speaker 1: And that breakdown of trust wasn't just a feeling, you know,
7:28
Speaker 1: it was directly fueled by what happened, and crucially, what
7:32
Speaker 1: didn't happen during the state's initial examination of Nolan's body.
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Speaker 3: This is where the medical findings get incredibly complex.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, because when Dr. Roger Mitchell, the independent pathologist in D.C.,
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Speaker 1: finally released his preliminary findings, the bottom line verdicts were
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Speaker 1: just chilling. Both the cause of death and the manner
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Speaker 1: of death are officially listed as Undetermined Pending Investigation.
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Speaker 3: And undetermined is a very heavy, very loaded word in
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Speaker 3: the realm of forensic mythology. We really need to separate
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Speaker 3: cause and manner here because they are totally distinct concepts.
8:07
Speaker 1: Walk us through that. What's the difference?
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Speaker 3: So the cause of death is the specific physiological event
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Speaker 3: that stopped the heart from beating. For example, asphyxiation due
8:16
Speaker 3: to drowning or a massive cerebral hemorrhage.
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Speaker 1: The biological reason, essentially. Right.
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Speaker 3: But the manner of death is a legal classification. There
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Speaker 3: are generally only five manners of death you can list
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Speaker 3: on a certificate. Natural, accident, suicide, homicide, and undetermined.
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Speaker 1: Okay, so Dr. Mitchell is essentially saying that based on
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Speaker 1: the physical evidence available to him on that specific day
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Speaker 1: in Washington, D.C., he cannot definitively point to the biological
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Speaker 1: mechanism that killed Nolan, nor can he legally classify how
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Speaker 1: that mechanism was triggered.
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Speaker 2: Precisely.
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Speaker 3: The physical evidence available to him was so compromised or
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Speaker 3: so ambiguous that it just could not paint a conclusive picture.
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Speaker 2: But, you know, what Dr.
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Speaker 3: Mitchell did find on the body is perhaps even more
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Speaker 3: alarming than the undetermined status.
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Speaker 1: Let's get into that because the specific physical finding here
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Speaker 1: has everyone reeling. Dr. Mitchell noted a focal area of
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Speaker 1: red discoloration in the soft tissue of the back of
9:11
Speaker 1: the head, specifically the occipital region.
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Speaker 2: Right, the base of the skull.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, and he noted that the etiology, meaning like the
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Speaker 1: origin or cause of this mark, is unknown at this time.
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Speaker 1: But Dr. Rutherford pointed out a crucial medical fact that
9:24
Speaker 1: we really have to linger on. She stated that this
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Speaker 1: red discoloration was an anti-mortem injury.
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Speaker 2: Which means it happened before he died.
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Speaker 1: Right. And that distinction is just huge.
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Speaker 3: It is the crux of this entire physical finding. There
9:38
Speaker 3: is a very common misconception that bodies can easily bruise
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Speaker 3: from being moved or transported or bumped after death.
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Speaker 1: Like in a body bag or something.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly.
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Speaker 3: But they generally do not. To understand why, you have
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Speaker 3: to look at the hemodynamics of the human body. A bruise,
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Speaker 3: or an area of deep red discoloration in the soft tissue,
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Speaker 3: requires active blood pressure.
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Speaker 1: Because you need the heart to physically pump the blood
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Speaker 1: out of the broken vessels?
10:03
Speaker 2: Exactly.
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Speaker 3: When a blunt force impact occurs, it ruptures the tiny
10:07
Speaker 3: capillaries in the tissue. If the person is alive, their
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Speaker 3: beating heart continues to pump blood through those vessels.
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Speaker 1: Okay, I'm visualizing this. Right.
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Speaker 2: So that blood.
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Speaker 3: Escapes through the ruptures and it pools in the surrounding
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Speaker 3: soft tissue, creating that deep red, purple, or blue discoloration
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Speaker 3: we all recognize as a bruise.
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Speaker 1: But if the heart is stopped?
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Speaker 3: If the heart is stopped, there is no pressure. The
10:29
Speaker 3: blood just settles by gravity. It's a process called liver
10:31
Speaker 3: mortis or lividity.
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Speaker 2: Oh, okay. But lividity looks.
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Speaker 3: Vastly different under a microscope and during dissection than an
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Speaker 3: active anti-mortem tissue hemorrhage.
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Speaker 1: Wow.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, the fact that the independent pathologist cut into this
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Speaker 3: tissue and identified it as a deep red discoloration.
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Speaker 2: Tells us something vital.
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Speaker 3: It tells us that Nolan sustained a significant, forceful impact
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Speaker 3: to the back of his head while his heart was
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Speaker 3: still actively beating.
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Speaker 1: And the size of this thing, I mean, the report
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Speaker 1: measured it at 12 by 8 inches. To give you
11:02
Speaker 1: a visual, an 8. 8 by 12 inch mark is
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Speaker 1: roughly the exact dimensions of a standard sheet of printer paper.
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Speaker 2: It's massive.
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Speaker 1: Try to visualize that. A standard sheet of paper placed
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Speaker 1: on the back of a human head. That is a
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Speaker 1: huge area of impact. It covers almost the entire back
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Speaker 1: of the skull and down toward the nape of the neck.
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Speaker 3: And the terminology used by the pathologist here is really vital.
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Speaker 3: They called it a focal discoloration. In medicine, we contrast
11:28
Speaker 3: focal with diffuse.
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Speaker 1: Meaning spread out versus concentrated?
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Speaker 2: Exactly.
11:34
Speaker 3: If a body had been tumbling in a river current,
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Speaker 3: hitting rocks and debris randomly over a long period, you
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Speaker 3: might see diffused, scattered.
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Speaker 2: Bruising all over the body.
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Speaker 3: You know, a small mark on the shoulder, a scrape
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Speaker 3: on the elbow, maybe a bruise.
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Speaker 2: On the thigh.
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Speaker 1: Right. Totally random.
11:49
Speaker 2: But a focal 12.
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Speaker 3: By 8 inch mark means the kinetic energy was highly concentrated.
11:55
Speaker 3: It was a specific, localized, massive trauma to the occipital
11:59
Speaker 3: bone area, which is the very base of.
12:01
Speaker 2: The skull at the back of the head.
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Speaker 1: So we have a sheet of paper-sized impact to the
12:06
Speaker 1: back of the head, sustained while he was alive. But
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Speaker 1: the report also noted that there was no underlying skull fracture.
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Speaker 2: Which is fascinating.
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Speaker 1: Yeah. How does someone sustain a blow that large, that
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Speaker 1: deep into the tissue without actually cracking the bone?
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Speaker 3: Well, the occipital bone is one of the thickest, most
12:24
Speaker 3: robust bones in the entire human skull. It evolved specifically
12:28
Speaker 3: to protect the base of the brain and the brainstem
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Speaker 3: from catastrophic trauma.
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Speaker 1: So it's like a built-in helmet.
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Speaker 2: It is.
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Speaker 3: It takes a tremendous amount of localized force to actually
12:38
Speaker 3: fracture the occipital bone. But, and this is crucial, just
12:42
Speaker 3: because the bone doesn't break doesn't mean the brain inside
12:45
Speaker 3: is safe.
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Speaker 1: Oh, right. The brain is just floating in fluid in there.
12:49
Speaker 2: Exactly.
12:51
Speaker 3: And this is where the independent examiner hits a massive,
12:54
Speaker 3: impenetrable blind spot in this case.
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Speaker 1: Because the immediate question is, Did that massive blow cause
13:00
Speaker 1: intracranial hemorrhaging, right? Like, did the brain bleed or swell
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Speaker 1: inside the skull?
13:06
Speaker 2: Yes.
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Speaker 3: And that is the absolute tragedy of a second autopsy.
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Speaker 3: When a massive impact happens without a skull fracture, the
13:13
Speaker 3: kinetic energy is transferred right through the bone and into
13:16
Speaker 3: the brain tissue.
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Speaker 1: Like a shockwave.
13:18
Speaker 2: Yes.
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Speaker 3: The brain can literally rebound against the inside of the skull.
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Speaker 3: We call it a coup-contrecoup injury. This can tear the
13:26
Speaker 3: bridging veins and cause a subdural hematoma, which is brain bleeding.
13:30
Speaker 3: The problem is, to check for that bleeding, you need
13:33
Speaker 3: the closed system of the skull to be perfectly intact.
13:36
Speaker 1: Oh, I see where this is going. It's like trying
13:38
Speaker 1: to tell how carbonated a soda can was before you
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Speaker 1: opened it, but someone else already popped the tab and
13:43
Speaker 1: poured it out.
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Speaker 3: That is a brilliant way to conceptualize it. It's exactly
13:47
Speaker 3: like that. Because the local state medical examiner had already
13:50
Speaker 3: processed the body, they had already performed a craniotomy.
13:54
Speaker 1: Meaning they opened the skull. Right.
13:56
Speaker 3: They used a bone saw to open the skull. They
13:58
Speaker 3: severed all the attachments and they removed the brain to
14:01
Speaker 3: weigh and examine it.
14:03
Speaker 2: By the time Dr.
14:03
Speaker 3: Mitchell receives the body in Washington, D.C., that pristine closed
14:07
Speaker 3: system environment.
14:08
Speaker 2: Is completely destroyed.
14:10
Speaker 1: It's gone.
14:11
Speaker 2: It's completely gone.
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Speaker 3: He cannot definitively determine if intracranial hemorrhaging occurred beneath that
14:17
Speaker 3: massive mark. Because the first examiner already altered the anatomy,
14:21
Speaker 3: drained all the fluids and and disrupted the delicate tissues
14:24
Speaker 3: that would actually hold the evidence of a brain bleed.
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Speaker 1: It's just, it's incredibly frustrating for the family, I imagine. Like,
14:30
Speaker 1: you have this glaring clue, this massive red flag, right
14:32
Speaker 1: on the back of his head, and the secondary examiner
14:35
Speaker 1: is essentially handcuffed by the fact that he's second in line.
14:38
Speaker 2: He's handcuffed by the procedure.
14:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, he can document the bruise, but the internal evidence
14:43
Speaker 1: that would explain the actual consequence of that bruise has
14:46
Speaker 1: been legally, like procedurally, removed by the state.
14:50
Speaker 2: And he can't get it back. Right.
14:51
Speaker 1: No. No. But, you know, as as shocking as that
14:54
Speaker 1: head injury is, it honestly pales in comparison to the
14:56
Speaker 1: absolute bombshell that dropped during the press conference regarding Nolan's neck.
15:01
Speaker 3: Oh, this is the moment the entire narrative of this
15:05
Speaker 3: case fractured.
15:06
Speaker 1: Yeah. So Ben Crump steps up to the podium and
15:09
Speaker 1: he reveals that when Dr. Mitchell unzipped the body bag
15:12
Speaker 1: in D.C., he discovered that the anterior inner neck structures
15:16
Speaker 1: were completely absent.
15:18
Speaker 2: Just gone.
15:19
Speaker 1: Gone. They were not received with the body. We are
15:22
Speaker 1: talking about the trachea, the laryngeal cartilage, the thyroid horn,
15:28
Speaker 1: and the hyoid bone. They were nowhere to be found.
15:31
Speaker 2: And to truly.
15:31
Speaker 3: Understand the gravity of this absence, we really need to
15:34
Speaker 3: dive deeply into the anatomy of the human neck.
15:37
Speaker 1: Please do, because this sounds huge.
15:39
Speaker 2: It is.
15:40
Speaker 3: These specific structures are essentially the black box flight recorders
15:44
Speaker 3: for forensic pathologists when they're investigating any suspicious death, especially
15:48
Speaker 3: when we're drowning in hanging, or manual strangulation is on
15:52
Speaker 3: the table.
15:53
Speaker 1: Okay, let's start with the hyoid bone because I know
15:55
Speaker 1: that one comes up in almost every true crime or
15:58
Speaker 1: forensic discussion. Like, it's famous.
16:00
Speaker 3: It is very famous in forensics. The hyoid bone is
16:03
Speaker 3: a fascinating piece of anatomy. It is a small, delicate,
16:08
Speaker 3: U-shaped or horseshoe-shaped bone situated in the anterior.
16:11
Speaker 2: Midline of the neck.
16:13
Speaker 1: So right in the front of the throat.
16:14
Speaker 2: Exactly, right between the chin and the thyroid cartilage.
16:17
Speaker 1: Isn't it like the only bone in the human body
16:19
Speaker 1: that doesn't articulate or connect with any other bone? It
16:23
Speaker 1: just sort of floats there in the throat?
16:24
Speaker 2: It does.
16:25
Speaker 3: It is entirely suspended by a complex web of ligaments
16:28
Speaker 3: and muscles. Its primary function is to anchor the tongue
16:31
Speaker 3: and assist in swallowing and speaking.
16:33
Speaker 1: Okay.
16:34
Speaker 3: But because of its location in the upper neck and
16:37
Speaker 3: its relative fragility, especially these two long projections in the
16:40
Speaker 3: back called the greater cornea or horns, the hyoid bone
16:45
Speaker 3: is incredibly susceptible to mechanical fracture during manual strangulation.
16:49
Speaker 1: So if someone's hands are wrapped around a throat, the
16:52
Speaker 1: pressure compresses the neck and actually snaps those little floating horns.
16:56
Speaker 2: Yes, exactly.
16:57
Speaker 3: When a forensic pathologist suspects asphyxiation by strangulation, they will
17:02
Speaker 3: meticulously dissect the neck. They strip away the soft tissue
17:05
Speaker 3: to isolate the hyoid bone, looking for microscopic hairline fractures.
17:10
Speaker 1: Wow, they look that closely.
17:11
Speaker 2: Oh, they have to.
17:13
Speaker 3: A fractured hyoid is one of the most definitive markers
17:16
Speaker 3: that intense, localized mechanical force.
17:18
Speaker 2: Was applied to the throat.
17:20
Speaker 1: But it wasn't just the hyoid bone that was missing here.
17:22
Speaker 1: It was the trachea, the actual windpipe. It was the
17:25
Speaker 1: laryngeal cartilage. It was the strap muscles.
17:27
Speaker 2: Right, the strap muscles.
17:29
Speaker 3: Muscles like the sternohyoid and the sternothyroid, which run down
17:32
Speaker 3: the front of your neck. Examiners don't just visually inspect
17:35
Speaker 3: them during an autopsy. They physically remove them to slice
17:38
Speaker 3: them paper thin and examine them under a microscope.
17:42
Speaker 1: What are they looking for when they do that?
17:44
Speaker 3: They are looking for something called petechial hemorrhaging.
17:47
Speaker 1: And what exactly is that on a biological level? I've
17:50
Speaker 1: heard the term on TV, but I don't really know
17:51
Speaker 1: what it means.
17:52
Speaker 2: Sure.
17:53
Speaker 3: Petechiae are these tiny pinpoint bursts in the capillaries. During strangulation,
17:58
Speaker 3: the pressure applied to the neck is often enough to
18:00
Speaker 3: compress the jugular veins, which carry blood away from the
18:03
Speaker 3: head back to the heart.
18:04
Speaker 2: Okay.
18:05
Speaker 3: But it's often not enough pressure to compress the deeper
18:08
Speaker 3: carotid arteries, which pump blood into the head.
18:11
Speaker 1: Oh, man.
18:12
Speaker 2: So the blood is going up, but it can't come
18:13
Speaker 2: back down.
18:14
Speaker 1: Precisely.
18:15
Speaker 3: This creates a massive, rapid spike in blood pressure in
18:18
Speaker 3: the head and neck. The pressure builds and builds until
18:21
Speaker 3: the smallest, most delicate vessels, the capillaries in the eyes,
18:24
Speaker 3: the face, and the strap muscles of.
18:25
Speaker 2: The neck, literally burst.
18:27
Speaker 1: So by looking at those neck muscles under a microscope,
18:30
Speaker 1: a pathologist can see the physical evidence of that trapped
18:33
Speaker 1: blood pressure.
18:34
Speaker 2: Exactly.
18:34
Speaker 3: They are also looking for deep tissue bruising that would
18:37
Speaker 3: indicate blunt force trauma to the throat, like a strike
18:40
Speaker 3: from a fist or some sort of object. Right. By
18:42
Speaker 3: completely removing the trachea, the cartilage, the muscles, and the
18:45
Speaker 3: hyoid bone, the state medical examiner essentially removed the second
18:49
Speaker 3: pathologist's physical ability to examine the airway for any signs
18:53
Speaker 3: of trauma, strangulation, or obstruction.
18:55
Speaker 1: Okay, I have to stop you right here because this
18:57
Speaker 1: is where the procedural logic gets incredibly murky for me.
19:01
Speaker 2: Okay, what do you mean?
19:01
Speaker 1: Well, during her analysis, Dr. Rutherford admitted that it is
19:05
Speaker 1: actually standard operating procedure for coroners to remove these internal
19:09
Speaker 1: structures during an initial autopsy.
19:10
Speaker 2: That's correct.
19:11
Speaker 1: If they suspect any neck trauma, they take the organs out,
19:14
Speaker 1: place them in a formalin solution to preserve them, and
19:18
Speaker 1: send them to a lab for that exact microscopic testing
19:20
Speaker 1: you just described.
19:21
Speaker 2: Yes.
19:22
Speaker 1: So if it is literal standard procedure to keep these
19:25
Speaker 1: parts for testing, why is everyone, including medical professionals like Dr. Rutherford,
19:30
Speaker 1: calling this a massive unacceptable failure on the state's part?
19:33
Speaker 3: What's fascinating here is that there is a vast gulf
19:37
Speaker 3: between standard medical procedure and the ethical protocol of transparency.
19:41
Speaker 1: Okay, explain that.
19:43
Speaker 3: Taking the organs to test them is the correct scientific step.
19:46
Speaker 3: That's good pathology. But retaining those organs and failing to
19:50
Speaker 3: document that retention and failing to inform the grieving family
19:54
Speaker 3: and the independent medical examiner, that is a catastrophic failure
19:57
Speaker 3: of the chain of custody and professional communication.
20:02
Speaker 1: So it's not the act of removing them. It's the
20:05
Speaker 1: fact that they essentially shipped the body off with a
20:07
Speaker 1: hollowed out neck and just didn't bother to tell anyone.
20:11
Speaker 2: Dr.
20:11
Speaker 3: Rutherford was incredibly forceful about this specific point. If a
20:15
Speaker 3: state medical examiner is going to withhold pieces of a
20:18
Speaker 3: human body, especially critical narrative defining structures like the entire
20:23
Speaker 3: inner neck, they have a professional, legal and ethical obligation
20:27
Speaker 3: to communicate exactly what was withheld, why it was withheld.
20:31
Speaker 2: And where it is currently being stored.
20:33
Speaker 1: So Dr. Mitchell in Washington, D.C., just unzips the body bag,
20:37
Speaker 1: begins his external and internal examination, and is completely blindsided
20:41
Speaker 1: by the fact that the entire airway is just gone.
20:45
Speaker 3: That appears to be exactly what happened. In a proper
20:48
Speaker 3: transparent transfer of remains, there should have been a detailed
20:51
Speaker 3: manifest or preliminary report sent right alongside the body.
20:55
Speaker 1: Like a checklist.
20:56
Speaker 2: Exactly.
20:57
Speaker 3: It should have explicitly stated, we have retained the anterior
21:00
Speaker 3: neck structures. including the hyoid and trachea, for microscopic analysis.
21:05
Speaker 3: They are currently in our lab. Here is what we
21:07
Speaker 3: are investigating.
21:08
Speaker 1: But they didn't do that.
21:09
Speaker 3: Because they failed to do that basic communicative step. The
21:14
Speaker 3: independent pathologist is effectively flying blind. He doesn't know if
21:17
Speaker 3: they threw them away, if they have them, or what
21:19
Speaker 3: they found.
21:20
Speaker 1: Which forces Dr. Mitchell to write an incredibly frustrating conclusion
21:24
Speaker 1: in his own report.
21:26
Speaker 2: He had no choice.
21:27
Speaker 3: I mean, he had to state in his official findings
21:29
Speaker 3: that because he did not have access to the neck structures,
21:32
Speaker 3: he absolutely cannot rule out injury to the neck as
21:35
Speaker 3: a contributing factor or cause of death.
21:38
Speaker 1: Wow.
21:38
Speaker 3: He cannot definitively rule out foul play, and he cannot
21:42
Speaker 3: rule out strangulation. The state's lack of communication literally paralyzed
21:46
Speaker 3: the second autopsy. They rendered the family's investment in an
21:49
Speaker 3: independent analysis almost moot regarding the neck.
21:52
Speaker 1: It is staggering. It's like You go to a second
21:55
Speaker 1: doctor for a second opinion on a tumor, but the
21:57
Speaker 1: first doctor threw away the scan and won't return your
22:00
Speaker 1: phone calls.
22:00
Speaker 2: It's exactly like that.
22:02
Speaker 1: This missing anatomy, this total breakdown of communication, is just
22:05
Speaker 1: one of several massive black holes in this investigation. And
22:09
Speaker 1: this led the family's attorney, Ben Crump, to outline seven
22:12
Speaker 1: very specific, heavily debated questions that the independent autopsy simply
22:17
Speaker 1: could not answer because of the condition the body was
22:19
Speaker 1: delivered in. Right.
22:20
Speaker 2: The seven questions.
22:21
Speaker 1: Let's walk through the mechanics of the most critical ones
22:24
Speaker 1: because they really highlight exactly how much forensic data has
22:28
Speaker 1: been lost here.
22:29
Speaker 3: Well, the first major unanswered question revolves around the presence
22:32
Speaker 3: of water in the airway in the lungs.
22:34
Speaker 1: Right. Was there water in Nolan's lungs? Was there debris
22:38
Speaker 1: like sand, silt, or algae deep in his airway?
22:40
Speaker 2: Which is how you prove drowning.
22:42
Speaker 1: Yeah. If a person drowns, they actively aspirate water into
22:45
Speaker 1: their lungs as they struggle to breathe. If they are
22:48
Speaker 1: deceased before they go into the water, they generally do
22:51
Speaker 1: not aspirate water. But Dr. Mitchell couldn't answer this. Why?
22:55
Speaker 1: Because the airway had been completely compromised and removed by
22:58
Speaker 1: the first autopsy.
23:00
Speaker 3: And the mechanics of drowning are incredibly complex. When a
23:03
Speaker 3: person aspirates water, it washes out the surfactant in the lungs.
23:07
Speaker 1: The surfactant.
23:08
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's the liquid that keeps the tiny air sacs,
23:10
Speaker 3: the alveoli, open so you can breathe. When that washes out,
23:14
Speaker 3: the lungs become incredibly heavy and waterlogged. Pathologists also look
23:18
Speaker 3: for microscopic organisms called diatoms, which are naturally found.
23:22
Speaker 2: In bodies of water.
23:23
Speaker 1: Oh, I've heard of diatoms. They're like little microscopic algae, right?
23:27
Speaker 2: Exactly.
23:28
Speaker 3: If a person drowns, these diatoms are absorbed through the lungs,
23:32
Speaker 3: pushed into the bloodstream by the beating heart, and they
23:35
Speaker 3: can be found lodged in the bone marrow or deep
23:38
Speaker 3: organ tissue.
23:39
Speaker 1: So finding diatoms in the bone marrow proves the heart
23:42
Speaker 1: was beating and circulating blood while the person was inhaling
23:46
Speaker 1: the water.
23:46
Speaker 3: Yes, it is a definitive marker of an active drowning.
23:50
Speaker 3: But to trace the path of the water, you really
23:52
Speaker 3: need the primary structures of the trachea and the main
23:55
Speaker 3: bronchi of the lungs.
23:56
Speaker 2: To be intact.
23:57
Speaker 1: And Dr. Mitchell didn't have the trachea.
24:00
Speaker 2: He didn't.
24:01
Speaker 3: And this lack of evidence ties directly into the overall
24:03
Speaker 3: condition of the body.
24:05
Speaker 1: Dr.
24:05
Speaker 3: Mitchell explicitly noted that the body arrived with marked decomposition.
24:10
Speaker 1: Which is really important. We need to talk about how
24:13
Speaker 1: a body decomposes in water because it is fundamentally different
24:17
Speaker 1: than what most people picture when they think of forensic
24:20
Speaker 1: science on television.
24:21
Speaker 2: Oh, vastly different.
24:23
Speaker 3: The forensic science of water deaths or aquatic forensics is
24:27
Speaker 3: honestly one of the most challenging fields in pathology. A
24:30
Speaker 3: body that is found face down near a body of
24:32
Speaker 3: water or partially submerged breaks down in a radically different
24:37
Speaker 3: manner than a body found in a dry indoor environment.
24:40
Speaker 1: Why is that?
24:41
Speaker 2: Water breaks.
24:42
Speaker 3: Extreme moisture and the unique bacteria present in aquatic ecosystems
24:46
Speaker 3: vastly alter the decomposition timeline.
24:49
Speaker 1: What actually happens biologically in the water?
24:52
Speaker 3: Well, in water, especially warm summer water like you would
24:55
Speaker 3: find in early July, bacterial growth accelerates exponentially. The body
25:00
Speaker 3: can undergo a process called saponification, where the body fats
25:03
Speaker 3: undergo hydrolysis and actually turn into a waxy, soap-like substance
25:07
Speaker 3: called adipocere.
25:09
Speaker 1: Grave wax, they call it. Right.
25:11
Speaker 2: Grave wax.
25:12
Speaker 3: And this can preserve some tissues beautifully, but completely obliterate others. Furthermore,
25:17
Speaker 3: if the body's in the water, it is subjected to
25:20
Speaker 3: aquatic scavengers, fish, turtles, crustaceans.
25:23
Speaker 1: And they can bite the skin.
25:25
Speaker 2: Exactly.
25:25
Speaker 3: Which can create artifacts on the skin that look exactly
25:28
Speaker 3: like trauma to the untrained eye, but it's really just
25:30
Speaker 3: post-mortem scavenging.
25:32
Speaker 1: And Dr. Rutherford brought up a fascinating point about forensic
25:36
Speaker 1: entomology regarding this exact microenvironment. She asked, was there bug
25:41
Speaker 1: activity on the body?
25:42
Speaker 3: Entomology, the study of insects on human remains, is one
25:45
Speaker 3: of the most accurate biological clocks we have in all
25:48
Speaker 3: of forensics. Blowflies have an incredible olfactory sense. They can
25:53
Speaker 3: detect the volatile organic compounds of decomposition from literally miles away.
25:58
Speaker 3: And they can arrive at a body within minutes of
26:00
Speaker 3: death to.
26:00
Speaker 2: Lay their eggs.
26:01
Speaker 1: But they can't do that underwater, right?
26:04
Speaker 2: Exactly.
26:04
Speaker 3: That is the critical distinction here. If no one was
26:07
Speaker 3: found dead on the dry shoreline, blowflies would colonize the body,
26:11
Speaker 3: lay eggs and the resulting maggots would progress through predictable
26:15
Speaker 3: life stages, which we call instars.
26:16
Speaker 1: Right.
26:17
Speaker 3: An entomologist can look at the size of the maggots
26:20
Speaker 3: and calculate backward to the exact hour the flies arrived,
26:24
Speaker 3: giving a highly accurate minimum time of death. But if
26:28
Speaker 3: Nolan was fully submerged in the water, insect colonization is
26:32
Speaker 3: delayed or entirely prevented until the body floats to the
26:35
Speaker 3: surface or washes ashore.
26:37
Speaker 1: So analyzing the bugs tells you not just when he died,
26:40
Speaker 1: but where the body has been resting for the past
26:42
Speaker 1: few days.
26:43
Speaker 3: It establishes the entire environmental narrative of the death scene.
26:47
Speaker 1: That's incredible. It is.
26:50
Speaker 3: But because of the advanced aquatic decomposition and the fact
26:54
Speaker 3: that the body had been aggressively processed, moved, refrigerated, and
26:59
Speaker 3: essentially hollowed out of key organs by the state, reading
27:02
Speaker 3: those delicate environmental clues became nearly impossible for Dr.
27:06
Speaker 2: Mitchell.
27:07
Speaker 1: Well, I really want you to put yourself in the
27:09
Speaker 1: shoes of this family. I mean, you have fought a
27:11
Speaker 1: bureaucratic nightmare. You've spent vast amounts of money to get
27:16
Speaker 1: your son's body to a top-tier independent expert in the
27:19
Speaker 1: nation's capital.
27:21
Speaker 2: It's exhausting just thinking about it.
27:23
Speaker 1: Yeah. And you receive the body in a state of marked,
27:26
Speaker 1: accelerated decomposition, completely missing its throat. And you find out
27:31
Speaker 1: the doctor can't even tell you if there was water
27:33
Speaker 1: in his lungs or bugs on his skin.
27:36
Speaker 3: And the frustration just compounds because another of the seven
27:41
Speaker 3: unanswered questions was about stomach contents.
27:44
Speaker 1: Right. The stomach contents are a foundational building block of
27:48
Speaker 1: a forensic timeline. Digestion is a mechanical and chemical process
27:52
Speaker 1: that operates on a remarkably predictable schedule.
27:55
Speaker 3: It's essentially a biological stopwatch that freezes the exact moment
28:00
Speaker 3: you die.
28:00
Speaker 1: That is a perfect analogy. When you eat a meal,
28:03
Speaker 1: the food enters the stomach where acids and enzymes break
28:06
Speaker 1: it down into a substance called chyme.
28:08
Speaker 2: Right, the liquid mixture.
28:09
Speaker 1: Then the stomach empties this chyme into the small intestine
28:12
Speaker 1: through the pyloric sphincter. And different types of foods digest
28:16
Speaker 1: at different, completely known rates. Carbohydrates digest relatively quickly, while
28:21
Speaker 1: dense proteins and fats take much longer.
28:23
Speaker 3: So if a pathologist opens the stomach and sees completely
28:26
Speaker 3: undigested pieces of a specific meal.
28:29
Speaker 1: They know the person died very shortly after eating.
28:32
Speaker 2: Exactly.
28:33
Speaker 3: If the stomach is entirely empty, but the small intestine
28:36
Speaker 3: is full of digesting food, they know several hours passed
28:39
Speaker 3: between the last meal.
28:40
Speaker 2: And the time of death.
28:41
Speaker 1: Because it already moved through.
28:42
Speaker 2: Right.
28:44
Speaker 3: The moment the heart stops, the autonomic nervous system shuts down,
28:47
Speaker 3: the sphincters relax or lock up, and the digestive process
28:51
Speaker 3: halts completely.
28:52
Speaker 2: The contents are just frozen in time.
28:55
Speaker 1: It answers so many questions.
28:57
Speaker 2: It really does.
28:58
Speaker 3: Were there pills in his stomach? Was there alcohol that
29:01
Speaker 3: hadn't been fully absorbed into the bloodstream? Was there evidence
29:04
Speaker 3: of a specific final meal that can be perfectly corroborated
29:07
Speaker 3: by witnesses who saw him last?
29:10
Speaker 1: But Dr. Mitchell couldn't assess the stomach contents either, could he? No.
29:13
Speaker 3: We have to assume, based on his report, that the
29:16
Speaker 3: stomach was either completely empty, it had already been processed
29:21
Speaker 3: and emptied by the first examiner, or its contents just
29:24
Speaker 3: weren't adequately preserved and transferred along with the body.
29:27
Speaker 1: It's like clearing the browser history on a laptop before
29:31
Speaker 1: handing it over to an IT guy to figure out
29:32
Speaker 1: how it got a virus. The data's just gone.
29:34
Speaker 2: That's a great way to put it.
29:37
Speaker 3: Without the stomach contents to establish a timeline of his
29:40
Speaker 3: last hours, and without the lung tissue and airway to
29:42
Speaker 3: determine if he aspirated water, the independent autopsy is severely hobbled.
29:47
Speaker 1: Yeah.
29:48
Speaker 3: You cannot definitively determine if Nolan was alive when he
29:51
Speaker 3: entered the water, if he was incapacitated beforehand, or how
29:55
Speaker 3: long he had been in that environment.
29:57
Speaker 1: And determining exactly how he entered the water and what
30:00
Speaker 1: state he was in when he did is heavily dependent
30:03
Speaker 1: on a fiercely debated detail that has completely fractured the
30:06
Speaker 1: public narrative.
30:07
Speaker 2: The clothing.
30:08
Speaker 1: What was he wearing? This is where the factual contradictions
30:12
Speaker 1: move from anatomical science into just basic, glaring investigative discrepancies.
30:17
Speaker 2: It's honestly mind-boggling.
30:19
Speaker 1: During the nationally televised press conference, Ben Crump stated very
30:22
Speaker 1: clearly that the search and rescue group, the United Cajun Navy,
30:25
Speaker 1: found Nolan... Fully clothed, face down. Right.
30:29
Speaker 2: Fully clothed.
30:30
Speaker 1: But almost immediately after he said that on television, the
30:32
Speaker 1: United Cajun Navy took to social media, specifically to X,
30:36
Speaker 1: to issue a very sharp, very public correction. They wrote,
30:41
Speaker 1: Attorney Crump, we didn't say Nolan was fully clothed when found.
30:44
Speaker 1: He was wearing only swim trunks. Please don't misrepresent our words.
30:49
Speaker 3: That is a staggering discrepancy on a remarkably basic fact
30:53
Speaker 3: of a crime scene.
30:54
Speaker 1: How does this even happen? I mean, you compound that
30:57
Speaker 1: statement with the actual video evidence we have. There is
30:59
Speaker 1: TMZ footage recorded at 2.23 p.m. on the day he vanished,
31:03
Speaker 1: July 4th.
31:04
Speaker 2: Right, the boat video.
31:05
Speaker 1: Yeah. The video appears to show a man matching Nolan's
31:08
Speaker 1: exact description on a boat, wearing a pair of distinctive
31:12
Speaker 1: blue swim trunks and completely shirtless.
31:14
Speaker 2: So no shirt, no shoes, just trunks.
31:17
Speaker 1: So I have to ask, how does a high profile
31:20
Speaker 1: legal team... with all their resources, all their investigators, make
31:24
Speaker 1: such a massive descriptive error in a live press conference.
31:28
Speaker 1: This isn't a typo in a brief. This changes the
31:31
Speaker 1: entire physical reality of the scene. Does this miscommunication point
31:35
Speaker 1: to a broader chaotic sharing of information among the search parties,
31:40
Speaker 1: the family, and the lawyers?
31:41
Speaker 3: It absolutely points to an information silo effect.
31:44
Speaker 1: What do you mean by that?
31:46
Speaker 3: Well, in high-profile cases where the official authorities go silent,
31:49
Speaker 3: a vacuum is created. The family is hearing fragments of
31:53
Speaker 3: information from volunteers who are out in the field. The
31:56
Speaker 3: searchers are reporting what they saw through their own informal
31:59
Speaker 3: chain of command.
32:00
Speaker 1: And it gets distorted like a game of telephone.
32:03
Speaker 2: Exactly.
32:04
Speaker 3: The lawyers are trying to synthesize witness statements without having
32:06
Speaker 3: access to the official time-stamped crime scene photos from the police.
32:11
Speaker 3: When these silos don't communicate perfectly, you get these massive
32:14
Speaker 3: factual collisions in public.
32:16
Speaker 1: Oh, but forensic-wise, this clothing distinction isn't just semantics. It
32:19
Speaker 1: is absolutely vital to the investigation. Let's play out the
32:22
Speaker 1: two scenarios and look at the timeline implications because they
32:25
Speaker 1: are wildly different.
32:27
Speaker 2: Sure. Let's start with Ben Crump's initial statement.
32:30
Speaker 3: If Nolan was found fully clothed, meaning he was wearing
32:33
Speaker 3: a shirt, maybe shorts over his trunks, maybe shoes, it
32:37
Speaker 3: completely contradicts the last known photographic and video evidence of
32:41
Speaker 3: him in just swim trunks on that boat.
32:44
Speaker 1: Right. Which means a highly specific sequence of events had
32:47
Speaker 1: to occur after the TMZ video was taken.
32:49
Speaker 2: Precisely.
32:51
Speaker 3: If he is fully clothed in the water, it means
32:54
Speaker 3: the boat ride ended safely.
32:56
Speaker 2: Oh, wow. Yeah.
32:57
Speaker 3: He had to have gotten off the boat, navigated back
33:00
Speaker 3: to wherever his clothes were, physically dressed himself, and then
33:04
Speaker 3: at some point after that, ended up dead in the water.
33:08
Speaker 1: That introduces a massive gap in time and location.
33:11
Speaker 3: It completely rewrites the timeline. It means investigators have to
33:15
Speaker 3: figure out where he went to change, who he interacted
33:18
Speaker 3: with while fully dressed, and how a fully dressed man
33:21
Speaker 3: ends up drowning or sustaining a 12 by 8 inch impact.
33:24
Speaker 2: To the head near the water.
33:27
Speaker 1: It expands the timeline by hours, potentially.
33:29
Speaker 2: It does.
33:30
Speaker 3: But on the other hand, if the United Cajun Navy
33:32
Speaker 3: is correct, and he was found wearing only swim trunks,
33:35
Speaker 3: it perfectly aligns with the TMZ video. Right. However, it
33:39
Speaker 3: leaves his exposure to the elements and the actual cause
33:42
Speaker 3: of death entirely open. If he's just in trunks, the
33:45
Speaker 3: timeline from being on that boat to being in the
33:48
Speaker 3: water could be seconds.
33:50
Speaker 1: He could have fallen off right then.
33:51
Speaker 3: He could have fallen off the boat. He could have
33:52
Speaker 3: dove in and hit something. It drastically shrinks the temporal
33:56
Speaker 3: parameters of the investigation, but it still doesn't answer why
33:59
Speaker 3: his body ended.
34:00
Speaker 2: Up where it did.
34:01
Speaker 1: So look at what we are dealing with here. You
34:03
Speaker 1: have conflicting data on his clothing, which shatters the timeline.
34:07
Speaker 1: You have missing neck bones that prevent a ruling on
34:10
Speaker 1: manual strangulation or throat trauma. You have an unexplained 12
34:14
Speaker 1: by 8 inch printer paper sized anti-mortem head mark.
34:19
Speaker 2: It's a complete mess.
34:20
Speaker 1: With all of this swirling chaos, with all these unanswered
34:23
Speaker 1: physical questions, how have the local authorities handled their public communication?
34:27
Speaker 3: By offering almost total silence to the family, mixed with, honestly,
34:32
Speaker 3: premature informal theorizing to the public. And in the world
34:35
Speaker 3: of death investigations, that is a highly toxic combination.
34:38
Speaker 1: The family has stated they are receiving a total lack
34:41
Speaker 1: of communication from local authorities regarding the preliminary findings and
34:44
Speaker 1: the ongoing toxicology reports.
34:46
Speaker 2: Which is unacceptable.
34:47
Speaker 1: But even worse, it was alleged that investigators floated the
34:51
Speaker 1: assumption to the public that there was, quote, no foul
34:54
Speaker 1: play or that this was simply an accidental drowning before
34:58
Speaker 1: the first autopsy was even completed.
35:01
Speaker 3: And this is what drew the absolute harshest critique from Dr.
35:03
Speaker 2: Rutherford.
35:04
Speaker 3: In forensic pathology and in law enforcement death investigations, you never,
35:09
Speaker 3: ever declare no foul play before the autopsy is finished
35:14
Speaker 3: and the toxicology results are back.
35:16
Speaker 1: Because you just don't know.
35:17
Speaker 2: You simply don't know what you don't know.
35:19
Speaker 1: You can't clear the room before you turn the lights on.
35:21
Speaker 2: Exactly.
35:22
Speaker 3: A body can look completely pristine on the outside. No
35:25
Speaker 3: defensive wounds, no gunshot wounds, no obvious trauma. But the
35:29
Speaker 3: toxicology report could reveal a lethal dose of a central
35:32
Speaker 3: nervous system depressant.
35:34
Speaker 1: Right.
35:34
Speaker 3: Or An internal examination could reveal a ruptured spleen from
35:38
Speaker 3: blunt force trauma that just didn't happen to bruise the skin.
35:41
Speaker 3: To declare an accidental drowning before you've analyzed the diatoms
35:44
Speaker 3: in the lungs or the blood in the brain is
35:47
Speaker 3: borderline investigative malpractice.
35:49
Speaker 1: And what does this all mean for Nolan's specific profile?
35:52
Speaker 1: I mean, we are talking about an 18-year-old college student.
35:56
Speaker 1: His father spoke passionately about how dedicated he was to football,
35:59
Speaker 1: how he prided himself on his physical health, his athletic ability,
36:04
Speaker 1: his body. Right.
36:05
Speaker 2: He was an athlete in his prime.
36:07
Speaker 1: We know college kids might occasionally experiment, but he was
36:10
Speaker 1: a highly focused athlete. Toxicology takes weeks to run through
36:14
Speaker 1: the mass spectrometers and gas chromatography machines. They test the blood,
36:19
Speaker 1: the urine, the vitreous humor in the eye.
36:21
Speaker 2: It's a very slow process.
36:23
Speaker 1: So if the state's eventual toxicology report comes back completely clean,
36:27
Speaker 1: no drugs, no alcohol, no central nervous system depressants, Does
36:32
Speaker 1: that completely shatter the state's preliminary whisperings of a simple,
36:36
Speaker 1: clumsy accident?
36:38
Speaker 3: It would certainly force them to explain a highly improbable scenario.
36:41
Speaker 3: I mean, how does a physically fit, completely sober, 18-year-old
36:46
Speaker 3: college athlete accidentally drown in a situation where he was
36:50
Speaker 3: surrounded by people in broad daylight?
36:53
Speaker 1: It doesn't make sense.
36:55
Speaker 3: And how does he sustain a massive focal 12 by
36:58
Speaker 3: 8 inch blow to the back of his head in
37:00
Speaker 3: the process? Did he fall backward onto a rock before
37:04
Speaker 3: entering the water? Was he struck by the hull of
37:06
Speaker 3: the boat?
37:07
Speaker 1: There are just so many variables.
37:09
Speaker 3: This raises the ultimate question about the state's initial strategy
37:12
Speaker 3: in handling this entire tragedy.
37:14
Speaker 2: Dr.
37:15
Speaker 3: Rutherford synthesized it perfectly, I think. The biggest mistake the
37:19
Speaker 3: state made wasn't necessarily botching the science, although withholding the
37:23
Speaker 3: neck organs without a formal transfer report is highly problematic
37:27
Speaker 3: and borders on incompetence.
37:29
Speaker 1: Right.
37:29
Speaker 2: Their biggest... most destructive mistake was botching the communication.
37:35
Speaker 1: They betrayed the public trust before the investigation even got
37:38
Speaker 1: off the ground.
37:39
Speaker 2: They really did.
37:40
Speaker 3: Given the high-profile nature of this case, given the racial
37:43
Speaker 3: dynamics that are often at play in these types of
37:46
Speaker 3: national stories, and given the family's immediate vocal apprehension, the
37:51
Speaker 3: state should have recognized the temperature of the room.
37:53
Speaker 1: They should have read the room.
37:55
Speaker 2: They should have looked at.
37:56
Speaker 3: The situation and said to the family, we have the body.
37:59
Speaker 2: We need to do our job.
38:00
Speaker 3: But before we touch anything, before we perform a craniotomy
38:04
Speaker 3: and alter the anatomy, we invite your independent medical examiner
38:08
Speaker 3: to be in the room. Or we will allow your
38:11
Speaker 3: expert to conduct their autopsy first under our observation.
38:16
Speaker 1: That would have solved everything.
38:17
Speaker 3: If transparency is the actual goal, you don't do a
38:21
Speaker 3: closed-door autopsy, quietly retain the airway and neck organs, hand
38:25
Speaker 3: over a decomposing body to a grieving family. and then
38:28
Speaker 3: vaguely float an accidental drowning theory to the press.
38:33
Speaker 1: It's staggering when you lay it all out like that.
38:37
Speaker 1: When we step back and look at the totality of
38:39
Speaker 1: what we've unpacked today, well, we have an 18-year-old boy
38:42
Speaker 1: whose light was extinguished way too early. We have a
38:46
Speaker 1: family desperately searching for the truth, spending hundreds of thousands
38:49
Speaker 1: of dollars just to get an independent autopsy that is
38:53
Speaker 1: physically unable to answer the most critical questions because of
38:56
Speaker 1: the state's procedural actions.
38:57
Speaker 2: It's just devastating.
38:59
Speaker 1: Then we have a 12 by 8 inch injury on
39:02
Speaker 1: the back of a young man's head that remains an
39:04
Speaker 1: absolute mystery because the evidence beneath it was discarded or
39:07
Speaker 1: irrevocably altered.
39:09
Speaker 3: It forces us to confront the fragility of truth in
39:11
Speaker 3: these investigations.
39:12
Speaker 1: It really does.
39:14
Speaker 3: We'd like to think of forensic science as this impenetrable
39:17
Speaker 3: objective shield. We think of microscopes and DNA and chemical
39:21
Speaker 3: analysis as foolproof. But objective science is incredibly vulnerable to
39:25
Speaker 3: human error. It can be instantly clouded, compromised, or even
39:29
Speaker 3: destroyed by a simple lack of basic human communication, hubris,
39:33
Speaker 3: and a failure of transparency.
39:35
Speaker 1: It leaves you with a really heavy, uncomfortable realization. I
39:39
Speaker 1: want you to mull this over as we finish up today.
39:42
Speaker 1: When the literal chain of custody of a human body
39:45
Speaker 1: becomes a tug-of-war between defensive local authorities and an untrusting public,
39:50
Speaker 1: Does the frantic pursuit of justice actually destroy the very
39:53
Speaker 1: physical evidence needed to find it?
39:55
Speaker 2: That's the real question.
39:56
Speaker 1: If transparency is sacrificed in the name of standard procedure,
40:00
Speaker 1: is the procedure itself fundamentally broken? Think about that 12
40:04
Speaker 1: by 8 inch mark on the back of the head.
40:06
Speaker 1: We might never know what caused it or what damage
40:09
Speaker 1: it did to the brain beneath it. Not because the
40:11
Speaker 1: science failed, but because the system did.