A grand jury declines charges in the Nolan Wells case, a Jackson man pleads not guilty in Tasia Fortune’s hanging death, and a Maryland suicide ruling lands on raw nerves.
By Stephanie Gadlin
A Mississippi grand jury has declined to charge anyone in the death of Nolan Xavier Wells, the 18-year-old Black college football player who disappeared during a July Fourth boat trip with a group of white friends and was found dead two days later off Horn Island. His parents rejected the decision on Sept. 22, telling reporters they do not believe their son simply drowned and vowing to keep fighting for answers.
The grand jury’s report was made public late on Sept. 21, the same week a Jackson man pleaded not guilty to murder in the hanging death of Tasia Fortune and Maryland officials ruled that a Black man found hanging from a tree in Prince George’s County died by suicide.
All three cases now join the Crusader’s ongoing “Lynchings By Suicide” investigation, which began after Demartravion “Trey” Reed, a 21-year-old Delta State University student, was found hanging from a tree on the Cleveland, Miss., campus on Sept. 15, 2025. The state medical examiner ruled Reed’s death a suicide within days, a finding his family continues to dispute.
Nolan Wells: ‘We’ll Never Stop’
Wells, a wide receiver at Southwest Mississippi Community College, went to Horn Island, a barrier island reachable only by boat, with high school friends on July 4. When the group returned to the mainland that afternoon, Wells was not with them. A park ranger found his body in the water off the island on July 6.
Investigators have long said Wells chose to stay behind. His family never believed it, and an independent autopsy that attorney Ben Crump released in July at the NAACP National Convention in Chicago found an unexplained area of discoloration at the back of Wells’ head and ruled the cause of death undetermined.
The grand jury, which heard from 43 witnesses, found Wells’ death “consistent with drowning.” Jackson County District Attorney Angel Myers McIlrath said there is “absolutely no evidence” that race played a role, according to NBC News. The state medical examiner, however, also ruled the cause and manner of death undetermined.
“Elmore and I do not believe that Nolan simply and accidentally drowned,” Christine Wonsley, Wells’ mother, said, according to CNN. His father, Elmore Wonsley, reminded supporters that his son is “not a hashtag, he’s our son.”
Crump said the district attorney wants the public to accept “We’ll never know,” while the family answers, “We’ll never stop.” The family is asking the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate and demanding release of the full case file and the state’s autopsy report. Mississippi has no statute of limitations on homicide.
Tasia Fortune: An Arrest, Not an Ending
Fortune, a 29-year-old mother of four, was found Aug. 3 hanging from a tree behind a vacant house on Road of Remembrance in west Jackson. From the start, her family insisted she did not take her own life.
After the state medical examiner ruled her death a homicide on Sept.10, Jackson police arrested Jarques “Jock” Ratliff, 51, the next day as he walked along Capitol Street and charged him with murder. Ratliff is African American, as was Fortune, according to Mississippi Today. Police said the two knew each other but have not said how.
Ratliff pleaded not guilty on Sept. 14 and was denied bond as a flight risk. His attorney, Toney Baldwin, called him “a pillar of the community” and said his client made no confession.
Jackson Police Chief RaShall Brackney called the arrest “not the conclusion” and said more arrests are expected. “We understand this case is being viewed through a broader lens, a global lens,” Brackney said, according to ABC News.
Christy Spivey, Fortune’s mother, said that when police told her about the arrest, “I just started crying and told them ‘thank you, thank you, thank you.’”
Activists want more. Byron Brumfield of Medgar Evers Reloaded: A Mission and a Movement said Ratliff “should be charged with a hate crime also, just like anybody else,” according to WLOX. Ward 3 Jackson City Councilman Kenneth Stokes has asked U.S. Attorney Baxter Kruger’s office for federal assistance.
Prince George’s County: A Ruling in Hours
In Upper Marlboro, Md., a Black man was found hanging from a tree outside a business on D’Arcy Road on the morning of Sept. 20. Within hours, the state medical examiner ruled his death a suicide with no other signs of trauma. He has not been publicly identified.
Police Chief George Nader said the man’s family agrees with the ruling. Relatives asked that his name be withheld and said the public attention had made his death “more unbearable,” according to the Maryland Daily Record.
County Executive Aisha Braveboy urged residents not to share images or spread speculation online. “This is a tragedy. A person is dead,” Braveboy said, according to WUSA9.
A Pattern the Crusader Has Tracked
Mississippi is where Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Chicago boy, was abducted and murdered in 1955, and where Mack Charles Parker was dragged from a Poplarville jail and lynched in 1959.
In February, JULIAN, the civil rights organization founded by attorney Jill Collen Jefferson, released “A Crimson Record,” a report documenting more than 70 suspected modern-day lynchings across seven Southern states since 2000. The report calls the federal Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act, signed in 2022, “toothless.”
The Wells family is pressing for a federal investigation. Jackson police have promised more arrests in Fortune’s killing, and activists are calling for hate crime charges. More than a year after Trey Reed was found on the Delta State campus, his family is still waiting on answers of its own.
Across these cases, families and advocates have made the same demand: release the grand jury findings, the autopsy reports and the evidence behind every ruling.
Discover more from InnerCity News
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
