Nolan Wells Death: A forensic pathologist breaks down the independent autopsy

[00:00:00]We're talking about Noah Wells.

[00:00:02]Teenager ended up dying in Mississippi on a boating trip during 4th of July weekend. It was ruled a death investigation and not a homicide. And that just did not play well with the family. So, they ended up hiring famous civil rights attorney Ben Crump to handle the case.

[00:00:22]And we heard some very interesting things because Ben Crump just happens to be here in Chicago where they released some of the findings of this independent autopsy here.

[00:00:32]But they ended up finding that a lot of the stuff was inconclusive, but the big key takeaway here is that they cannot rule out foul play.

[00:00:41]Ben Crump's words, not mine.

[00:00:43]But sometimes there are people out there who end up going against the grain and going for an independent third party autopsy.

[00:00:52]And this next man is famous when it comes to that third-party autopsy and getting a different narrative out there because sometimes the facts just don't add up here. So, Dr. Michael Baden, who is a famous pathologist, joins us now right here on Chicago Live. Doctor, thank you so much for being here today.

[00:01:12]>> Good to be here with you, Brett.

[00:01:14]>> What was your big key takeaway when you heard Ben Crump talking today about the autopsy for Noah Wells?

[00:01:21]>> Well, not only was he talking about it, but they did release the second autopsy, which your assistant sent to me.

[00:01:29]And that has a lot of information that's helpful, but the most important information as to whether there is foul play or not uh is not present in the second autopsy.

[00:01:43]For example, what kind of clothes was uh Mr. Wells wearing? Was he wearing a bathing suit or not? Uh and that has to come from the police, not from the uh second autopsy. The first autopsy would have uh described the clothing.

[00:02:02]Uh toxicology has to be completed, which should be completed pretty soon.

[00:02:07]Uh the condition of the lungs uh is uh not adequate in the second autopsy to determine if brow drowning has occurred or not because uh the dissection of the lungs uh and diffuses away any uh water that might be present. That would be present in the first autopsy, which has not been released.

[00:02:32]Uh so, and whether or not the the second autopsy does indicate that there's no evidence of any kinds of injuries uh to the internal organs uh or to uh uh the external of the body except for a uh odd uh bruise discoloration the back of the of the head the right the the back of the uh head. Uh and the the problem is with a second autopsy that the first autopsy does uh damage uh that has to be considered.

[00:03:11]Uh and um the uh toxicology hasn't been done.

[00:03:18]And has to be uh further examined. The second autopsy makes further incisions.

[00:03:23]These incisions in the second autopsy revealed some kind of discoloration.

[00:03:28]Whether it's uh due to blood, whether it's due to uh uh trauma before death or after death.

[00:03:36]Cuz a body in water gets uh can hit rocks and uh wooden uh logs and things in the water can strike bodies. Uh so, that there are a lot of uh second degree secondary in injuries that can occur after death that have to be distinguished from what happened before I guess there's agreement that he did was found in the water.

[00:04:04]And what his condition was before that.

[00:04:07]>> Especially because we heard from his family saying that Nolan Wells was an excellent swimmer and if he did indeed drown what were the circumstances behind it but the fact that they were missing the throat they got to look at the stomach to to see how much water may have gotten in his system. Was he being physically held under or was there some other circumstances here?

[00:04:27]The other thing that really jumped out at me of what kind of sparked this whole thing is that when his family ended up getting his cell phone they said that there were it appeared that some of his messages were erased. When a family says that to you in a situation like this what immediately comes to mind doctor?

[00:04:46]>> Well the the the uh family uh has to be be taken in the full account and and uh uh what they say but that's more of a police investigation and that uh as to whether uh anything was removed that shouldn't have been removed but also there may be security cameras around uh and other people's uh cell phones that the police have and there will be a lot more information gathered from them and even the telephone calls etc. So that uh the autopsy doesn't give you the whole picture uh in in in in any drowning death because any drowning death could be accident suicide or homicide if this is a drown a drowning death.

[00:05:35]Uh and the circumstances around the how the person got in the water and what happened before he went in the water uh becomes uh uh very important and that's gathered mostly by uh by the police and in interrogation, speaking to any kind of witnesses who may be there.

[00:05:58]And the police have a lot of that.

[00:06:00]There's a lot of that. The fact that there's no neck organ, uh one of the things that the first autopsy uh uh considered the possibility of strangulation, and that's why they have kept the windpipe, the Adam's apple that we compress that uh which is the the thyroid cartilage. Uh in neck compression uh strangulation, for example, there there may be fractures there. So, it's not uncommon for the first autopsy personnel to be able to keep that and to do further dissection.

[00:06:36]There's no evidence that there was any brain damage, but if there was blood around the brain, uh that wouldn't be present for a second autopsy. So, they the police and the medical examiner know a lot more that has been released. But the second autopsy certainly did uh uh bring a lot of information for the public to uh and the family to consider.

[00:07:00]>> Well, especially that when you hear it was originally death investigation, and you heard Ben Crump say, "We can't rule out foul play." And then in that second autopsy that you were just mentioning here, they they're not ruling out that there might have been some kind of strangulation. Of course, there's still that a lot of has to be uh talked about here. What when somebody hires somebody like you and and looking at this from what was ruled originally and now there's a lot of questions here, do you think that authorities in Mississippi may have did anything wrong here? May have had a misstep in drawing a conclusion too soon?

[00:07:34]>> Well, they they haven't drawn a conclusion. So, uh I don't see any evidence that uh there has been a misstep. However, we'll know more later, but but Brett, to to to make it clear, the autopsy gives a certain amount of information. And as I say, uh there are certain things that we can't make a diagnosis by autopsy alone, such as a drowning, a fire death, a fall from a height death, because accident, suicide, and homicide have to be considered and ruled out or ruled in.

[00:08:08]And this is one of those deaths that we don't even don't have any information as whether or not they there was water in the in the lungs. If he inhaled water, that means he was alive when he went into the water. If he didn't inhale water, uh then there's a more of a concern that was he dead before he was put in the water.

[00:08:29]Uh so, the first medical examiner did the autopsy, knows that, the police know that, but that can't be derived from the second autopsy.

[00:08:38]>> And it was very surprising for some of the people who were sitting in in that press conference when they talked about how there were certain organs in Nolan Wells' body that were missing. They were and some are drawing a conclusion saying like, "Oh, that was removed for nefarious reasons." But this thing sort of happens all the time. Were you also watching this yourself saying, "Yeah, that's that's pretty common, even if I'm being brought in to do a third-party autopsy."

[00:09:04]>> Yeah, I was watching and what I considered was they were doing a pretty uh uh detailed and correct autopsy in the first autopsy because they kept the one object that would permit them to further investigate whether there was strangulation.

[00:09:24]Which is one of the important considerations when there's no external evidence of injury of foul play, the internal uh, evidence of injury happens in triangulation cases, uh, because, uh, the injuries are underneath the skin. And the second what the first autopsy is done whenever the body is found, uh, and gives you some information how long the body has been dead, as do the stomach contents, tells you how long the food has been in the stomach.

[00:09:55]Uh, but, uh, the, uh, second autopsy is a week later or and, uh, there has been some decomposition and that can also cause skin discoloration.

[00:10:07]Uh, so, the area of, uh, discoloration in the back of the head, uh, may or may not have happened before death and that, uh, microscopic examination and, uh, my would be would clarify whether it was before or after death.

[00:10:24]>> You brought up another good point and then they talked about this today during the press conference was the fact that because the battle uh, the body was badly decomposed, they couldn't find any significant bruising.

[00:10:35]And time seems to be a factor anytime you're trying to make a scientific determination on how somebody died here.

[00:10:45]Does how much time goes by where if the the body is badly, uh, decomposing like that that the bruising goes away? Does it is it a matter of a few days or is it a few weeks?

[00:10:55]>> It it entirely depends on how hot the surrounding environment is.

[00:11:02]Uh, how hot the water is, how hot the air because, uh, in the in, uh, very hot weather, a body in an in an apartment that's not air-conditioned can goes to severe decomposition within two or three days and that causes discoloration of the outer skin.

[00:11:21]Uh, usually the bruising of any significance will go deeper into muscle and all, that would still be available and that's, uh, what the second autopsy doctors looked at and they found the hemorrhage deep in the soft tissues on the back of the head.

[00:11:41]Now, whether that was there before death, after death, or or whether the autopsy itself or decomposition caused that decomp that discoloration uh, is best determined from what the first autopsy showed and photographed.

[00:11:58]Remember, part of the obligation of the person doing the autopsy is to document any injuries that are present a vet that can be made available to review by other forensic pathologists and that would have been done on the first autopsy, but apparently hasn't been released yet to the second people did the second autopsy.