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The Nolan Wells Death Investigation Conflict · Murder Files Unsealed

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Right now, sitting in an evidence locker in Jackson County, Mississippi.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: There's this small rectangle of glass and metal, and it
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: basically holds the final hours, the final locations, and you know,
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: the final conversations of a dead eighteen year old boy
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: and his grieving family is just desperate to see inside it.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: The police are desperate to see inside it, but no
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: put he's allowed to turn it on.
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it is a complete standoff. You basically have this
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: private tragedy colliding head on with really rigid public procedure. Yeah,
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: and it creates this absolute legal guidlock. I mean, both
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: sides in this scenario genuinely believe they are protecting the truth,
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: even as they are completely at odds over how to
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: actually extract that trip right.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: And that's exactly why we're dedicating this deep dive to
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: this specific standoff today, because it represents this massive, rising
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: tension that goes way way beyond just a single investigation
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: in Mississippi. It's like a fundamental clash over digital evidence,
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: public transparency, and these deeply entrenched ethical codes of the
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: justice system. So I guess let's lay out the groundwork
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: for what we are actually looking at here.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: Sure, let's do so.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: As of right now, mid August twenty twenty six, we
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: are dealing with a highly active, ongoing investigation, very active, right,
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: And it begins on July fourth, you know, a day
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: of celebration. An eighteen year old named Nolan Wells goes
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: on a boating trip out to Horn Island, which is
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: a barrier island out in the Gulf, right, and he disappears. Yeah,
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: and then two days later his body is discovered along
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: the shoreline.
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: And you have to understand, the wounds for that family
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: and really the surrounding community are incredibly.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: Fresh right now, Oh absolutely, the.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: Sudden tragic loss of a young life under highly scrutinized circumstances,
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: it just inherently breeds this desperate immediate need for clarity.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: People want to know what happened, minute.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: By minutes, of course they do. It's human nature, exactly.
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: But the justice system, by its fundamental design, is not
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: built for It's just not built for immediate public satisfaction.
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: It is built for a methodical and often agonizingly slow procedure, right, which.
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: Brings us to the core of this whole thing. Think
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: of this situation like an unstottable force right of grieving
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: family demanding answers meeting an immovable object, which is the
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: strict ethical codes binding a district attorney.
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: That is a perfect way to frame it, the immovable
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: object versus the unstoppable force.
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and to really understand this legal gridlock, we have
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: to look at the specific accusation the family is making
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: and the specific piece of evidence at the center of.
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: It all the cell phone.
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: The cell phone. So the family has hired attorneys, and
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: those attorneys have publicly accused the district attorney office of
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: not operating in good faith. Right, and the entire crux
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: of this dispute, you know, the reason they're throwing out
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: terms like bad faith, It centers entirely on the forensic
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: examination of Nolan Well's cell phone.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and the family's legal team is making a very
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: specific distinction here. They are insisting they are not refusing
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: to cooperate, right, they are hiding the phone exactly. They're
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: perfectly willing to hand the phone over, but only for
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: what they are calling a joint forensic examination.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's unpack this. Because they are demanding established procedures
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: regarding how this examination will happen. What the chain of
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: custody will be and how any data recovered from that
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: device will be handled.
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: What's fascinating here is they want their own independent experts
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: in the room alongside law enforcement when that digital vault
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: is open.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: Wait, really in the room, in.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: The room, or at least jointly overseeing the process. And
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: they are utilizing very precise legal terminology things like chain
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: of custody and handling of data to basically establish a
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: boundary line with the authorities.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: Okay, but I have to ask, isn't that standard operating
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: procedure anyway?
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: Well, yes and no.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: I mean the police collect the evidence, they take it
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: to a lab, and they examine it. Why should a
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: private family grieving or not get to dictate the terms
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: of a police investigation.
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: I know it sounds unusual.
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: It just seems like an incredibly dangerous precedent. Like if
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: my house is robbed, I don't get to tell the
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: crime scene investigators how to dust for prints. You know,
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: I don't get to demand my own private detective stands
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: over their shoulder while they do it. I just hand
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: over the security footage and let them work. So why
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: put conditions on handing over the phone when you are
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: so desperate for answers.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: It's because a cell phone is vastly different from a
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: dusty countertop or a physical piece of security footage. Okay,
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: how so to understand the family's hesitation, we really have
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: to look at the microscopic mechanics of digital forensics. Digital
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: data is just unimaginably fragile.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: A modern smartphone is essentially a digital fingerprint of a
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: human life. It holds location data, timestaff communications, heart rate logs,
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: social media.
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: Pings, basically everything everything.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: It is the most critical piece of evidence in establishing
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: a timeline. But unlike a physical piece of evidence, like
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: say a torn piece of clothing or a weapon, digit
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: data can be perminentally altered just by the mere act
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: of looking at it improperly.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: Wow, Okay, give me a concrete example of that. If
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: the police take the phone and just plug it into
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: a computer in a back room, what is the actual
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: risk there?
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: The major risk is the corruption of metadata metadata right,
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: think of a digital photograph, the picture itself, you know,
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: the visual image is the data, but the invisible information
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: attached to it, like the exact millisecond it was taken,
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: the GPS coordinates of where you were, standing, the model
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: of the camera, the shutter speed. That is the metadata. Okay,
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: I'm falling, and that metadata is often far more valuable
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: to a criminal investigation than the actual picture.
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: So if a local investigator, maybe someone who isn't highly
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: trained in advanced digital forensics, simply powers the phone on
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: to see if it works, they risk destroying that invisible
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: timeline instantly, Yes, instantly, just by turning it on.
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: The moment of phone boots up, its operating system starts
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: writing new files. It reaches out to local cell towers
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: to establish a connection, of course, which logs a new
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: location timestamp. It might automatically download background data or system updates.
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: In a matter of seconds, hundreds of system files are
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: altered or overwritten. Oh wow, Yeah, the chronological integrity of
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: the device's hard drive is ruined. The digital crime scene
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: has effectively been trampled over by muddy boots.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: That makes so much sense. I didn't even think about
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: the phone as connecting.
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: To a tower exactly. Furthermore, if a forensic extraction tool
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: like a Celebrate device is used incorrectly, or if the
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: phone isn't placed in a faraday bag to block incoming
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: radio signals, remote wiping could occur, or the extraction software
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: itself could corrupt the metadata logs.
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: Okay, So the family is terrified that the local authorities
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: might accidentally delete the actual answer to how their Sun died.
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: Precisely by demanding a joint forensic exam and clear procedures
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: for the chain of custody. They're trying to ensure that
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: this vital evidence isn't mishandled by a local department that
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: might not have the highest tiered digital experts.
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: On hand, right, because if that data is corrupted, any
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: defense attorney down the line will have a field day
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: with it.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: Oh massive field Babs.
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: We'll just argue the evidence is tainted and get it
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: thrown out.
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: Exactly. The family wants oversight to guarantee the integrity of
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: the puzzle. They want a seat at the table to
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: ensure the phone is mirrored, meaning copied bit by bit
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: without altering the original drive completely by the book.
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: Okay, So that makes complete logical sense from the family's perspective.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: They are just trying to protect the data inside it
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: from any potential misstep.
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: It's very understandable.
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: But the district attorney is fiercely pushing back against this
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: idea of a joint examination or or sharing any procedural
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: control really very fiercely right. Jackson County District Attorney Angel
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: Meyers mackl Wrath released a very stark public statement addressing
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: the family's criticism, and her defense is entirely rooted in
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: the ethical and legal boundaries of her office.
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: Right. She explicitly stated that legal and ethical rules severely
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: limit what she can publicly disclose or accommodate during an
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: active investigation.
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: So what does this all mean in practice? Like it
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: sounds to me like the DA is playing a high
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: stags game of poker where the crowd is screaming at
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: her to show her cards. But if she flips them
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: over now, she automatically forfeits the entire game.
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: That is a brilliant analogy. Yes, we are crossing over
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: from private grief into public duty here. Mackell Wrath points
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: out that prosecutors simply do not have the same freedom
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: as private individuals or even private attorneys representing a family.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: Right because the family's lawyers can say whatever they want
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: on the news.
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: Exactly, a private attorney can go on television and demand
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: transparency all day long. A district attorney cannot she cannot
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: discuss evidence, she cannot talk about witness cooperation, and she
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: certainly cannot negotiate the forensic protocols of an active investigation
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: in the public sphere.
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: So the grand jury pool is kind of like a
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: sterile clean room where sensitive microchips are built. Yes, and
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: the DA is the person standing at the door making
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: sure nobody walks in wearing muddy boots. If she starts
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: tweeting about the case or publicly debating the family's lawyers
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: about how a cell phone will be examined, she is
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: the one tracking mud into that sterile room.
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: And then the whole batch is ruined. Exactly that mechanism
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: is exactly what she is protecting. Her primary mandated responsibility
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: isn't to appease the public's curiosity, and tragically, it isn't
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: even to ease a family's immediate.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: Anxieties, which is so hard to swallow.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: It's incredibly hard. But her responsibility is to protect the
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: integrity of the investigation and the grand jury process.
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: Let's actually dig into that mechanism for a second, because
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: why is the grand jury such a fragile ecosystem. It
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: always feels like this archaic, secretive process that constantly frustrates
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: the pubbling in high profile cases. Why does the DA
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: have to remain totally silent to protect it.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: To understand the secrecy of the grand jury, you really
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: have to look at its historical purpose, because grand jury
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: does not determine guilt yor innocence.
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: Right, It's just an initial step exactly.
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: Its sole purpose is to impartially re view evidence presented
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: by the prosecutor and determine if there is enough probable
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: cause to even bring criminal charges in the first place.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: It is basically a hurdle the government must jump over
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: before they are allowed to put a citizen on trial.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: So it's essentially a check on the prosecutor's power to
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: make sure they aren't just charging people arbitrarily.
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: Exactly. It acts as both a sword and a shield.
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: It is a sword for the state to compel evidence
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: and testimony, but it's historically a shield for the citizen.
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: One of the fundamental reasons grand jury proceedings are held
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: in such strict secrecy is to protect the reputations of
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: the innocent.
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: Oh, okay, that makes sense.
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: Imagine a scenario where a DA is investigating a prominent
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: local figure for a heinous crime. They bring witnesses in,
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: they examine financial records, they look at phone data, and
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: after weeks of investigation, the grand jury realizes the person
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: is completely innocent. Wow, Yeah, the charges are dropped. But
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: if all of that evidence and all of those initial
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: suspicions were broadcast publicly, day by days, reputation would be
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: permanently destroyed by an unfounded accusation before they ever even
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: saw a courtroom.
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: Right, So the silence isn't just bureaucratic red tape like
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: a lot of people think. It is a foundational pillar
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: of civil rights. The DA is legally gagged to ensure
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: that nobody is convicted in the court of public opinion
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: based on half baked evidence.
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: Precisely, and in a high profile case like the death
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: of Nolan Wells, the dental grand jurors are living in
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: the community right.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: Now, right They're watching the news, they.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: Are watching the local news, They're reading the statements from
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: the family's attorneys online. If those grand jurors are exposed
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: to fragments of evidence or legal disputes over how a
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: cell phone is being handled in the media before that
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: evidence is officially presented in a controlled legal setting, their
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: impartiality is completely compromised.
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: The well is poisoned.
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: Well is poisoned if the DA bends to the family's
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: pressure and says publicly, you know, okay, we agree to
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: your terms. We will do a joint exam. Here's exactly
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: how we're handling the phone. She is confirming the existence
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: of potential value of specific evidence outside the courtroom.
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: And a defense attorney would be watching that broadcast taking notes. Oh.
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. A defense attorney could later argue that the grandeurers
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: were prejudiced by the DA's own public statements, and the
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: entire case could be thrown out.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: God, that is so delicate. So the DA's ultimate goal,
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: as she explicitly stated in the text, is to present
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: the grand jury with a thorough, complete and fair investigation.
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: Yes, and that mandate supersedes everything else. If she breaks protocol,
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: she jeopardizes the entire prosecution. So she is fiercely protecting
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: the possibility of justice for Nolan Wells, even if that
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: protection looks like cold institutional silence to his grieving parents.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: Which creates an absolutely agonizing legal catch. Twenty two. The
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: DA cannot be transparent because transparency is a literal threat
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: to the integrity of the prosecution. But to a grieving family,
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: that lack of transparency feels like a deliberate lack of
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: good faith. It feels like a cover up, or at
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: least incompetence.
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: It's an awful position for everyone.
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: And this naturally creates a massive information vacuum in the community.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: You have a tragic death, a family begging for answers,
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: and a district attorney legally bound to ignore them in public.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: And here's where it gets really interesting, because we all
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: know how the modern world handles an information vacuum.
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, the public rushes into fill it, right, and
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: they rarely fill it with verified facts.
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: No, they do not, And Makuath actually had to address
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: this directly in her statement. She explicitly cautioned the public
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: against drawing conclusions based on information being shared online. She
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: had to because she is sitting in this impossible position
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: where she has access to the actual investigative files. She
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: knows what is real and what isn't. But she noted,
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: she cannot publicly identify which pieces of information circulating on
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: the internet have been verified and which have been deemed
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: completely false.
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: Right, it must be so frustrating for her.
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: There's actually a quote from her in the source text
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: that really stood out to me. She said, the the
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: fact that something is said does not necessarily mean it's
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: actually true. Yeah, she essentially had to plead with the
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: public to step back and allow investigators to complete their
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: work rather than pressuring her office for disclosures that are
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: literally illegal for her to make.
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: If we connect this to the bigger picture, this really
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: highlights a monumental and relatively new burden placed on modern prosecutors. Yeah.
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: How difficult is it for a prosecutor to sit back
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: and watch false narratives spread online knowing she holds the
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: verified truth but is legally gagged from correcting the record.
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: It is an immense burden because that sterile clean room
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: of the legal system we talked about, it's constantly.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: Under siege now by the Internet.
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: Exactly a generation ago, a DA only had to contend
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: with the local newspaper or the evening news, which operated
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: on a defined, predictable cycle with editorial standards.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: Right, you had reporters who understood the law.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but today they are battling a relentless twenty feirter
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: sels cycle of social media speculation. You have Reddit sleuths,
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: Facebook community groups and TikTok creators forming rigid conclusions based
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: on hearsay, partial facts, or just total fabrications.
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: It's wild. Put yourself in the shoes of that prosecutor
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: for a minute. The absolute agony of sitting in your
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: office watching a viral video on TikTok that names a
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: potential suspect or can cox some wild theory about what
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: happened on Horne Island, knowing that millions of people are
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: watching it and getting enraged, and you have the verified
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: truth sitting on your desk that completely debunks the video,
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: but you are legally barred from correcting the record because
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: if she tweets out, you know, actually rumor x as
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: falls because we found why on the victim's phone. She
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: just violated the sanctity of the grand jury.
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: She just tracked mud into the clean.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: Room, exactly. She just tracked mud everywhere.
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: She is essentially fighting a massive public relations war with
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: both hands tied behind her back. She must balance the
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: very real, visceral human pain of the Wills family and
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: the community's entirely natural desire for swift justice against the rigid, methodical,
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: and often deeply unpopular requirements of the law her commitment
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: by oath is to the actual truth and an understanding
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: of the law, not to internet speculation. But standing firm
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: on that principle, especially in the face of widespread public
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: outrage and aggrieving family, it requires immense institutional discipline. It
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: really does have a profoundly isolating position for a public
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: servant to.
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: Occupy it is, and so we are looking at a
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: deeply heartbreaking stalemate. To sum it all up, you have
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: the tragic death of Nolan Wells on July fourth. You
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: have a cell phone sitting in limbo because the family,
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: completely aware of how fragile digital evidence is and terrified
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: of losing the truth, is demanding joint oversight and strict
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: chain of custody protocols before handing it over. And on
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: the other side, you have a district attorney who is
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: absolutely bound by ethical confidentiality, refusing to negotiate evidence handling
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: in the press, all to protect the PROCs nature of
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: a future grand jury process.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: And you really have to remember that neither side is
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: acting out.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: Of malice here, right, They both want the same thing exactly.
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: The family believes they are fighting for the truth by
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: demanding oversight of their son's digital life, ensuring no technical
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: blunders ruin the case. DDA believes she is fighting for
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: the truth by strictly adhering to the protected legal process
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: designed to ensure a fair investigation, ensuring no procedural blunders
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: ruin the case. Right, they are both pursuing justice, they
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: are simply separated by the vast gulp between private desperation
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: and public protocol.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: Which leaves us with a lingering question that extends far,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: far beyond Jackson County in Mississippi. Given how much of
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: our entire lives, you know, our locations are private conversations,
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: and sometimes the very circumstances of our greatest tragedies are
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: locked inside our cell phones. Will the slow, traditional eighteenth
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: century legal procedures of chain of custody and grand jury
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: secrecy ever be able to peacefully coexist with a modern
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: public that expects instant digital answers.
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: That's a great question.
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: Or is the sterile clean room of the justice system
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: simply incompatible with the Internet age. Definitely something to think about.