Heartbreaking F@rewell: Emotional photos capture Nolan Wells’ parents walking behind his c@sket after the pastor’s moving eulogy
HEARTBREAKING photos from Nolan Wells’ funeral showed the standout football player’s blue casket draped in flowers as his family demands answers.
Friends and family of Nolan gathered on Monday to celebrate the life of the beloved student-athlete at a funeral in his hometown in Ocean Springs, Mississippi.
Nolan vanished during a Fourth of July outing with friends to Horn Island, a barrier island about 10 miles from the Mississippi mainland.
The 18-year-old’s body was recovered from the shorelines near the island’s northwest tip two days later following a multi-agency search and rescue operation.
On Monday, hundreds of Nolan’s friends and family gathered at Center Pointe Church for what his mother, Christine Wonsley, called a party to celebrate his life.
“I want to give all thanks and honor and glory to God for choosing Elmore and me to be Nolan’s parents,” Christine said at the funeral through tears.
“We thank you Lord, for the beautiful 18 years that you blessed us with him.”
Christine called her son “protective and nurturing” and spoke about how he once told her he wanted to be a father of three daughters.
“Your absence has left an emptiness that can never truly be filled,” she said.
“In a world that can often feel dark, be like Nolan, be the light that brightens the lives of those around you.”
Many of the mourners, including Nolan’s high school football teammates, were dressed in black and blue – the colors of the school’s team.
Elmore Wonsley, Nolan’s father, spoke about how proud he was of his son and the nickname he gave him because of his stellar play on the football field.
“I nicknamed you Mr. Cool Hands, because it seemed like you were catching a touchdown every game,” Wonsley said.
“You wanted to be the best, so I poured all my knowledge into you that I could, by taking you to the gym to work out, taking you to the beach to do drills in the sand, teaching you how to watch film, how to study your opponents’ strengths and weaknesses.
“And you carried these teachings all the way through high school.”
The emotional father added, “You grew up to be a very young man that everyone enjoyed to be around.
“Nolan meant a lot to a lot of people, and today just shows us how much he meant to the community, to the country and to the world.”
Reverend Al Sharpton delivered the eulogy as the family’s attorney, Ben Crump, continued the call for justice in Nolan’s case.
During his eulogy, Sharpton offered a $50,000 reward for anyone who brings a tip leading to an arrest or conviction in the case of Nolan’s death.
Sharpton later revealed that Tyler Perry, the actor and director who paid for the funeral expenses, matched his $50,000 reward and brought the total to $100,000.
“Until we get to truth, until we get to justice, we gonna stand up and we gonna keep ringing the justice bells for Nolan Wells,” Crump said.
Meanwhile, director Spike Lee, who was at the family’s press conference in Harlem on July 10, also attended the funeral.
A cause of death for Nolan has not been determined, pending an autopsy.
On Wednesday, Crump said the case will be presented to a grand jury after the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department completes its investigation.
“The hope is that when this is presented to the grand jury, all relevant witnesses and evidence will be presented to them, so that we can have a fair and impartial investigation into the death of Nolan,” Crump said.
District Attorney Angel McIlrath’s office said convening a grand jury is standard practice in the county for unnatural or suspicious deaths, and does not indicate there is any criminality involved.
Jackson County officials have said that preliminary evidence suggests Nolan died from accidental drowning.
Authorities said that so far in their investigation, they have yet to find evidence of foul play.
The family is also conducting an independent investigation into Nolan’s death, citing concerns over the racial history in Mississippi.
Crump added that his team of independent investigators will collaborate with Jackson County officials to inspect Nolan’s cell phone.
“We also agreed that we would have a mutual inspection of the cell phone, with our experts and their experts,” Crump said.
The civil rights attorney said officials will help them “with the cellphone downloads, so everybody will be able to see at the same time what the cellphone has.”
Nolan’s mother, Christine, previously raised concerns that her son’s cell phone was tampered with before she retrieved it from his friends.
When she examined her son’s cell phone, she discovered no posts on his Snapchat accounts, which was anomalous for someone who posted videos and pictures on the platform daily, Christine said.
“There were no saved pictures. There were no snaps from that day,” she said at the July 10 press conference.
“Anyone who’s ever been around Nolan will tell you at social gatherings, he’s taking videos, he’s taking pictures, he’s even come up to me when I’m getting ready to go to bed, ‘Hey, Ma, come on, take a picture of me.’
“You know, that was Nolan, so that’s why we feel that things may have been deleted, because of the fact that there was nothing in either one of his accounts.”
You can watch The U.S. Sun’s chats with United Cajun Navy’s national vice president Brian Trascher and Josh Gill, the incident coordinator for Nolan’s search, on our YouTube channel.
