Nolan Wells’ cause and manner of death ‘undetermined,’ state autopsy report finds
An undated photo of 18-year-old Nolan Xavier Wells. (Courtesy of the Wells family)
(NEW YORK) — The family of Nolan Wells on Wednesday released the Mississippi State Medical Examiner’s autopsy report on the 18-year-old’s death. It found that the cause and manner of death are “undetermined.”
This conclusion matches the findings of the private autopsy commissioned by Wells’ family, which preliminarily ruled his cause and manner of death as “undetermined pending investigation,” with the independent pathologist acknowledging multiple limitations in the report.
“Losing a child, it truly breaks your heart … especially someone like Nolan, who brought so much joy and light and life to everyone,” Wells’ mother, Christine Wonsley, told reporters in July.
“The only question we have is, what happened to our son?” she said.
The circumstances surrounding Wells’ death garnered national interest after the college football player went missing on the 4th of July after going on a boat trip with friends to Horn Island. Officials said it appeared Wells stayed behind on the island after his friends left.
The teen’s body was recovered on July 6, and authorities said they suspect he drowned.
Jackson County Sheriff John Ledbetter said there was no initial indication of a crime, but he stressed that investigators were “working diligently to determine exactly what occurred.”
Ledbetter also said the sheriff’s office welcomed the family’s independent investigation.
Created by CDC microbiologist Frederick A Murphy, this transmission electron micrograph (TEM) revealed some of the ultrastructural morphology displayed by an Ebola virus virion. (Photo by Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images).
(NEW YORK) — The American doctor infected with Ebola said he is “cautiously optimistic” about his health improving amid more severe symptoms.
Dr. Peter Stafford contracted the disease while working with patients in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He was evacuated to Germany to receive specialty care and is currently hospitalized at Charite University Hospital in Berlin.
“Before I was evacuated I was feeling really concerned I wasn’t going to make it, and now I’m cautiously optimistic,” Stafford said in a press release from Serge, the international Christian missionary group that employs him.
His colleague, Dr. Scott Myhre, Serge area director for East and Central Africa, said Stafford is critically ill but feeling better than he did on Wednesday, and is able to eat small amounts of food.
Stafford initially experienced what are known as “dry” symptoms such as fever, aches and fatigue.
However, he is currently experiencing “wet” symptoms including vomiting and diarrhea. Myhre said Stafford’s laboratory reports are “trending slightly in the right direction.”
“Peter has also received two intravenous treatments designed to improve Ebola outcomes,” Myhre said in the press release. “The German care teams rotate in three-hour shifts since they must wear full-body hazmat suits as they care for him. We’re thankful for their dedication and expertise.”
On Wednesday, Stafford’s colleague, Matt Allison, executive director of Serge, told ABC News that the doctor has been receiving monoclonal antibodies during his hospitalization.
Stafford’s wife, Dr. Rebekah Stafford, and their four children landed in Berlin at 10 p.m. local time Wednesday and have been moved into a separate space at Charite University Hospital. All are asymptomatic and will continue to isolate and be monitored, according to Serge.
The organization added that Stafford’s family is able to see him through a window.
Meanwhile, another Serge missionary physician, Dr. Patrick LaRochelle, is currently at Bulovka Hospital in Prague. He is quarantine and remains asymptomatic, Serge said.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday announced new arrival restrictions for flights carrying people who were recently in Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda or South Sudan amid the Ebola outbreak in the region.
Flights will be ordered to land at Washington-Dulles Airport in Virginia, the notice said, where “enhanced public health measures are being implemented.”
The Ebola outbreak in the eastern DRC had caused 139 suspected deaths with nearly 600 suspected cases as of Wednesday, according to an update from World Health Organization Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
Tedros said cases of Ebola have been reported in several urban areas of the eastern DRC amid the ongoing outbreak, including the major cities of Goma and Bunia, and that at least two cases and one death have been recorded in neighboring Uganda’s capital, Kampala. Cases have also been reported among health workers, according to Ghebreyesus.
At least 51 cases have so far been confirmed in the ongoing outbreak.
The DHS flight restriction notice said that while South Sudan has not reported any confirmed cases in the current outbreak, “It is considered at high risk because of its close border with affected areas in eastern DRC and Uganda, limited healthcare infrastructure and cross-border population movement.”
The outbreak was first detected in the DRC’s northeastern province of Ituri, with cases officially confirmed by the health ministry on May 15. It marks the 17th outbreak of Ebola virus disease in the DRC, which is Africa’s second-largest country and its fourth-most populous nation.
The WHO convened an emergency committee on Tuesday night, following Tedros’ declaration of a public health emergency of international concern on Sunday — one level below a pandemic in the United Nations agency’s alert system.
It was the first time a WHO chief had declared such an emergency before convening the emergency committee. After the meeting, the committee agreed that the outbreak did not meet the criteria of a pandemic emergency, which was applied to the global COVID-19 outbreak.
Anais Legand, the WHO’s technical officer for viral hemorrhagic fevers, said on Wednesday that the Ebola outbreak may have started a couple of months ago and that investigations are ongoing.
“Our priority is really to cut the transmission chain by implementing contact tracing, isolating and caring for all suspects and confirmed cases,” she said.
The current outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo virus, a rare variant of Ebola for which there are no approved vaccines or therapeutics and which requires different diagnostics than other variants. Case fatality rates for previous Bundibugyo outbreaks have ranged from 30% to 50%, according to the WHO.
Dr. Satish K. Pillai, incident manager for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Ebola response, confirmed at a CDC press conference on Tuesday that genetic testing from this outbreak shows it is similar to the “genetic fingerprints” from outbreaks in 2007 and 2012, meaning there are diagnostic tools available that can detect this strain of Ebola.
Pillai said on Monday that the agency had activated its Emergency Operations Center through its country offices in the DRC and in Uganda, and is deploying technical experts that have been requested from Atlanta headquarters.
The risk to the U.S. general public remains low, Pillai said.
Also on Monday, the CDC introduced entry restrictions on non-U.S. passport holders that had been in Uganda, the DRC or South Sudan in the previous 21 days before attempted entry into the U.S.
ABC News’ Eric M. Strauss, Mary Kekatos and Morgan Winsor contributed to this report.
Ariel Gonzalez Rodriguez has been charged with manslaughter with a firearm, months after he allegedly shot and killed neighbor. (Collier County Sheriff’s Office)
(NEW YORK) — A man has been charged with manslaughter months after he allegedly shot and killed his neighbor, mistaking him for a bear, according to an arrest affidavit.
Ariel Gonzalez Rodriguez, 25, was charged on Tuesday for the March killing of his neighbor Jason Sheffield in Naples, Florida.
Rodriguez’s wife, Katherin Hidalgo, told investigators that she heard a noise around midnight and was worried a wild animal was attacking the farm animals she has in her backyard, so she woke her husband up to investigate, according to the affidavit.
After leaving the house with a smaller caliber rifle, Rodriguez — who was 24 at the time — returned to tell his wife he believed it may have been a bear, before retrieving a larger caliber rifle, according to the affidavit.
Rodriguez told investigators he fired a single round from the larger rifle to the ground. Rodriguez then alleged he believed the noise was walking closer and that he was about to be attacked, prompting him to shoot a round in the direction of his neighbor’s property at about waist level, according to the affidavit.
Hidalgo told investigators she heard at least two gunshots before her husband returned to the residence, according to the affidavit.
Hidalgo told investigators that Rodriguez told her whatever was making the noise — which he believed might have been a bear — began approaching him, so he shot off a “couple of warning shots,” according to the affidavit.
“According to Katherin, Ariel did not further investigate because he feared he might have wounded the bear and did not want to risk getting attacked. He told Katherin he would go check in the morning,” the affidavit said.
Around 8 a.m. the next day, Rodriguez explored his property but did not see anything. He then proceeded to explore his neighbor’s property, where he discovered his neighbor lying face down with blood on his body, according to the affidavit.
In the morning, Rodriguez told his wife he had shot someone before dialing 911, according to the affidavit.
Rodriguez dialed 911 and stayed on the phone with dispatchers until deputies arrived. Rodriguez was brought in on the charge of manslaughter with a firearm, according to the affidavit.
“Ariel was frantic as he informed the dispatcher that he shot off a gun yesterday at a noise he believed to be a bear, but now believed he accidentally shot his neighbor,” investigators wrote in an arrest affidavit.
When officers responded to the scene, Rodriguez and his wife were handcuffed, detained and placed in the back of separate patrol vehicles, according to the affidavit.
Investigators found the neighbor dead, lying face down in an overgrown patch of vegetation behind a chicken coop. He appeared to have blood on the back of his shirt, according to the affidavit.
(NEW YORK) — Tropical Storm Lala continues to track through the central Pacific Ocean and is forecast to strengthen into a hurricane as it approaches the Big Island of Hawaii on Saturday.
As of 5 a.m. ET, Lala is moving west-northwest at 10 mph with maximum sustained winds of 60 mph and is approximately 455 miles east-southeast of Hilo.
Hurricane warnings remain up for Hawaii County while tropical storm watches remain in place for Maui County, including the islands of Maui, Lanai, Molokai and Kahoolawe.
Lala is forecasted to continue gradually strengthening Friday into Saturday as it makes a close approach to the Big Island early Saturday.
While the exact timing and intensity of the impacts are still uncertain and will ultimately depend on how close Lala tracks to the Hawaiian islands, heavy rain, strong winds and rough surf impacts are likely this weekend.
Heavy rainfall and gusty winds will begin to impact the Big Island Friday, bringing the possibility of life-threatening mudslides and landslides, especially across areas with steep terrain.
Lala is forecasted to bring rainfall of 8 to 12 inches across Maui and the Big Island, with the highest totals reaching up to 25 inches across the higher elevations of the Big Island. The remainder of the Hawaiian Islands are forecasted to receive 4 to 6 inches of rainfall.
Large and dangerous surf, especially on the Big Island, is also expected this weekend. The greatest impacts are expected along exposed windward and southern shores. The prolonged period of heavy surf may cause localized coastal flooding and significant beach erosion.
