Defense Attorney BREAKS DOWN Explosive Nolan Wells Audio and Boat GPS

Willie D Live.

What's up, family?New audio, GPS data, and a grand jury review has put the Nolan Wells case directly in the spotlight.Joining us today is attorney Jack Palmieri to help break it all down and make some sense out of all of this.Jack, welcome to the show.

Thank you so much for having me.

Good morning to you as well.Absolutely.Absolutely, man.What I want to do is play the audio for you first.and get your comments and then we'll go over the GPS data.

Shedding light on the moments before some of Nolan Wells friends left Horn Island off the coast of Mississippi.A mom of one of the friends last week said the group left without Nolan when their boat began malfunctioning.

We're sinking.Can you all please come?

NBC News has obtained audio as part of a records request that details the group calling for towing assistance.

And is everybody on board in good health otherwise?Yeah.

Yeah, everybody talks away.

Nolan went to the island in a boat with friends on July 4th.His body was found two days later.It's unclear whether Nolan was with anyone when he disappeared.This as the search for answers in the death of 18 -year -old Nolan Wells continues.His family's attorneys saying they'll now work side by side with investigators to analyze Nolan's cell phone.So everybody will be able to see at the same time.

what the cell phone has.

Nolan's parents previously said they believe content may have been deleted from the phone.The case will be presented to a Mississippi grand jury once the investigation is complete.The local district attorney telling NBC News, that's a standard practice for cases with an unknown cause of death and not an indication that a crime was committed.Jackson County Sheriff John Ledbetter says his team has interviewed several witnesses and is working to get answers for the family.Do you feel like you're getting useful information that's been helpful to figuring out what happened?

Yes.sir.We're getting very useful information.And we appreciate the public coming forward with what they've had.And we don't want them to be hesitant.

Today, the family met with a district attorney for more than an hour.It was just a meeting where she talked about the process.

She didn't tell us any information about the investigation.We're trying to get to those answers.

As tonight, Nolan's family prepares to hold his funeral next week.

He would not want us to be sitting around crying and eating.And so what we're going to do is kind of have a party to celebrate him.

Tom, the state and independent autopsy results are not back yet.The family attorney says he does plan to release those details when he has them.

All right, Jack.What's your first thoughts on this newly released audio audio?

Regardless of what you think of the narrative being put forth.It's consistent with the narrative Okay, so it's consistent with as I've read in other articles and other interviews and videos.It's that Nolan went to this party with a first group of friends on this first boat and Some of the stories I've seen, there are two kind of narratives out there.One narrative is Nolan decided to stay behind when this first boat was leaving.This first boat seemed to acknowledge it was taking on water.I guess it was a rental boat and they wanted to get it back to the mainland before they wouldn't be able to.

So the first group of friends got on the boat and returned back without Nolan.That's one of the stories I've seen just from Reports that have come out from friends, from other young adults that were there.And we can get into why he may have stayed, you know, later.So now just listening to the audio, there are some things that I noticed are there and are not there.Caller seems relatively calm and you hear, you don't hear anything going on in the background.Um, these are all young adults.

You know, the reality is a young man is not with us anymore.And if you are unfortunate enough to witness something like that, that is traumatic.I mean, no one's ready, ready for that.Um, and you don't hear anyone fussing the background.It's a very calm call.It's very quiet saying, Hey, we're taking on water.

We're fine.We're coming back.Now again, I'm not saying you have to accept what's being said, but the way it's being said, I don't know that these young adults, 18, 19 year olds and partying, that they are equipped.to fabricate a real -time event.And it's consistent with the narrative that the boat was taking on water, had issues, was brought back, docked, was taken out of dock, and then the owner of the boat is also cooperating with law enforcement.So if you are of the belief, if you accept that when you pull behind, the audio is consistent with that.

And if you are unsure, which is very fair because a lot of people information evidence has not come out yet.If you're unsure or if you just don't accept that you think he was on the boat.It's it's such a quiet call that I can't rule anything out.I was not there.I'm an outside observer just like you.I can only, you know, analyze what's what's we're being fed.

And because it's such an emotional event that's occurred, there's a lot of things at play here.Race, age, these are college kids, the community,so many things.I try to strip away the subjective stuff, just look at it objectively.I try to analyze it for what we have, not what we think it is.The call is consistent with one of the narratives.

How come they didn't say, how come they didn't ask the caller how many people are on the boat?Cause that seemed like an obvious question to me.Like if I'm not even an 9 -1 -1 operator or a boat, a Marine, a maritime dispatcher, but I would say, well, how many people are on the boat?Cause I need to know what kind of boat I need to bring to rescue y 'all.

Right.Great.So your concern is, is excellent.And it, deviates just slightly from what the question would be.The answer, the most direct answer to your question, I don't know why dispatch did not ask the question.We're speculating, we can guess.

And we're all Monday morning quarterbacking.We can all replay what's happened and say, you could have done this, you should have gone left when you went right.It's very easy for us to do that.I don't know why dispatch didn't ask the persons.What they did ask was, is everyone one, two, four, six, seven, and the six or seven seems to be that, that number of six or seven, depending on if you believe Nolan was there, but was everyone okay?That answer came back.

Yes, everyone is fine.Now, to your point, Maybe they should have asked, how big is the boat?What kind of boat do you want?Oh, I'm a dinghy.It's like a four person dinghy.Or we're on a mini yacht or something.

Or it's a catamaran versus a single hull.But also maybe because they called it in, but ultimately did not receive assistance.Why didn't they receive assistance?A different question.But the boat made it back independently.It was taking on water, it appears,

if you if you accept the call for what it is they were giving notice look we're having trouble we're making it back but we're here you know in case the scenario could have been now the boat gets stranded midway right and i don't know what the communication systems were on the boat um but Those are good questions.Maybe because it's their protocol because there was no one that was said to be injured or said to be in peril.There was no distress in the call.You know, the dispatchers listening to it like we are and because they had nothing more that they were asked to do, right?They could have gone maybe, you know, to say, why did they go?You're right.

These are kids on a boat.Send someone out anyway, right?That's what we pay tax dollars for.They didn't.Um, and that's a fair question.Um, and it would have helped to answer was Nolan on the boat or not, right?

It's a third party, uh, without someone else being there.We can't say for sure.Again, if you're questioning what's being given to us so far, We're asking these questions in part now because we've learned someone has passed.Someone's not with us anymore.That is an 18 -year -old young man.You know, that's tragic.

But if it had just been the boat took on water and got back, and we're not talking about it today, maybe no one questions why more wasn't done.Because it wasn't given as an emergency situation.

Yeah, yeah, and we're going to have, there's going to be many questions regarding the audio in the coming days.I don't want to belabor this.Let's get into the GPS data.

In the Nolan Wells case we've been following.

Yeah, our CBS News partners revealing some new GPS data from the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources tracking the movement ofthe boat Nolan Wells was on before he disappeared July 4th.

Bob Holston joins us now live from the boat launch with more details.Good morning to you, Will.

Good morning, Bill and Brandi.Good morning everybody joining us at home.That's right, the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources releasing the GPS data of where the boat that Nolan Wells was on on July 4th and its whereabouts on that day just to kind of narrow down that timeline a little bit more.Here's what we know from the data.9 .56 a .m.

the boat left land and then went towards Horn Island which it arrived around 11 .14 a .m.Then the GPS data says that the boat left the island around 431 p .m.Before traveling into Fort Bayou and returning to the dock at 606 later that night the boat went to the boat launch here at Fort Bayou and was pulled out of the water and Taken back to the owners home and Biloxi now a DMR report also says that the owner of the boat his mother and one other person with wells are all cooperating with the investigation Now this doesn't necessarily point to one person or point to anything in particular, but now there's concrete evidence of when and where the boat was at what times.We have heard reports that the boys left the island right around at 4 .30 and now that's starting to hang out.

That is being backed up now.We'll see exactly what this does for the investigation as time continues.Live in Ocean Springs, Will Poulsen, WLOX News Now.

So you just heard the report about the GPS.How important is the GPS data to the investigation?

I think no matter what is important, it's important because we're still establishing credibility of everyone involved.We're still establishing consistently of what's been told to authorities.as we're going on.So whether or not, even if, again, it's important, even if we maintain, if you choose to believe Nolan wasn't on the first boat, we want to know everyone's being honest, everyone's being forthright.And it's important because, you know, If you are found to lie about one thing, you'll lie about anything else.Right.

And so it helps to corroborate and to establish who we're dealing with in addition to what did or did not happen.So I think it's really important.

OK, so so the sheriff, John Ledbetter, he immediately said on the same day that Nolan's body was recovered that he suspected no foul play.Does that seem a little suspicious to you?Because I hear this oftentimes in cases specifically like this where you have black people who end up dead and it's a suspicious situation where somebody can say, well, they probably committed suicide or it was an accident.And even when black people are hung, they say immediately, We don't suspect any foul play.If saying we don't suspect foul play is not suspicious, it shouldn't give you pause to trust the authorities.Why don't they ever say we suspect foul play first?

Why do they immediately say we don't suspect foul play, but they don't immediately say we don't suspect foul play?

That's a really fair question.And I agree.

Let me back up.They say we don't they say we meet immediately.They say we don't suspect foul play, but they don't immediately suspect foul play.suspect foul play.

I agree with you on this point.I always maintain law enforcement should be held to a higher standard.You know, we're dealing with children who are the witnesses, who are the friends.We're dealing with parents who are grieving.We're dealing with civilians who are not trained.We approach them.

We still want them to be honest.We approach them with a certain level of expectation.Then you have professionals.This is your job, officer, you know, deputy.This is what you do.And before you can get into the race component, which is important, you understand, first of all, you understand someone has passed away.

You have a grieving family.You have students who are involved.You don't know what's happened yet.Secondly, this has gotten a certain level of attention and you are being scrutinized.And thirdly, the reality is, There is a young man who was dead, who was black, and many of his friends and others are white.And people are going to look at that.

And as law enforcement, you have to be aware of that.And you have to at least be respectful, acknowledge that these factors are in play.I think it was at best, it was sloppy, but it was, I think it was reckless how, premature he was to make that call, whether that turns out to be an official determination or not, we're not there yet.And we can still criticize that when we get there, but I agree with you.I think it was, he should have been more open to all possibilities.And the best answer would have been to your point, not even to say we suspect foul play or we don't suspect it, but we don't know everything.

is at play.Everything's available here.This could be a homicide.This could be acover -up.This could be an accident.

But we don't know.And to say one against the other is disrespectful to no one, to the family, to the black community, right?Because we're all watching this.We all want the same thing.We all want the truth.We all want justice.

You know, it's about how you feel.Everyone wants the right people accountable.and it is - Respectfully, respectfully, Jack, I don't think everybody wants justice.

I don't think everybody wants justice.And I believe that's why we're here right now, because everybody don't want justice.If you look at the DA in this case, the DA has been accused of protecting law enforcement that was accused of killing, unjustly killing black people in the past.If you look at if you look at the local coroner in Jackson County, and you look at the coroner in Mississippi, the medical examiner, chief medical examiner, they both have shady history of people accusing them of coverups.So I don't believe that everybody want justice.I mean, are there any, if you're looking at the evidence that you've been privy to so far, You know, are there any red flags that you see?

Yeah.So before I get to the second question, I, I like your, your pushback and your right.I think we as a community, as people, as Americans, we should want justice.Right.And we as people, as citizens should, should hold the prosecutor accountable, should hold law enforcement.Absolutely.

I don't want that either.Whether you're black, white, Latin, Indian,male, female, because if it happens to one of us, it can happen to all of us.You know, everyone always ignores it until, you know, oh, well, it didn't happen to my people, my, that, you know, and then it always comes full circle.You should never tolerate that no matter who you are, where you come from, because it comes full circle.So I agree with that.

We hold the people that we, that we are, told to trust with the system, we gotta hold them to that scrutiny.That is very fair, that is very appropriate, that is why defense attorneys like me exist, to hold them accountable.And when they run afoul, we call them out on it, because they hold the system up, absolutely.As far as red flags, I don't, again, going back to being premature with what a person opinions from professionals are, right?Like a medical examiner, stuff like that.I don't like commentary until the all about the autopsy until the cause of death until that's done.

But the same reason you're saying, you know, uh, there was a mention from the Caribbean Navy officer that no one's toxicology did not rise to the level of intoxication.Um, that may or may not be found to be true.How that person got to come to that opinion, I don't know.Without doing a proper autopsy, I don't know how another professional made a chemical determination on Nolan's body.That's concerning to me for the same reason you're saying, because we need to know the truth, not what you think.You wait for the toxicology, right?

Let that come out.you know, because we are still waiting to hear or is there any trauma to Nolan's body?You know, that's going to be, those are things I'm waiting for.I need to hear what happened to Nolan, you know, how is the term was there, you know, when, when they do these, um, these autopsies, they're going to determine, was there water in his lungs before or after he passed?That's something I'm looking for.Is there any kind of trauma to his exterior body?

It was epidermis.That's something I'm looking for, right?Those are things I haven't heard yet.You want to throw a red flag?I've not yet heard what efforts are being done to examine the boat.We know Nolan was on the boat at some point, so his DNA should be there.

But given the timeline, given the students, if there was any residual blood DNA that will be there, if it was present, is any, what is anyone doing to preserve the boat, preserve the, the condition, you know, you have oxidation, you have other chemical reactions to, to evidence.What are they doing to preserve it?What are they doing to analyze the sea?Like you said, who was on the boat?If something.more tragic happened to Nolan, not just what, where did it happen?

You know, did he?Yeah.So things like I want to see more, I want to hear more about, I don't need, I don't want presumptions.I want to know more is being done in the investigation, not just as blanket.We're looking into it.You know, that's rude.

That sounds really nice.Uh, I've not yet heard about if the boat If the GPS left breadcrumbs, you know, a lot of modern GPS devices, you can track, okay, I left the house at 10.I got to your house at 11.that's fine.But what route did I take?That's the important part I have not yet heard.

Can they track, did the boat go directly from the island to the mainland?You know, cause maybe the half hour differences, currents, they're taking on water, so you can't go too fast.I'm not a maritime expert.I've been on a boat.I'm not a boating expert.I know there's a front and a back and water all around, but I don't know what you would do as far as speed when you're taking on water.

But what I want to know is, was the route, going back from the island, the same as to the island, or did it deviate in some manner?Right?I've not heard anything about that.And most modern boats, most modern GPSs, they leave breadcrumbs.I've not heard anything about that.Um, the things that are objective, the things that you don't need testimony on that they, you know, audio speaks for itself.

Video speaks for itself.You know, we analyze these videos.The video doesn't care about our feelings.It just shows what it shows and we react to it.This data will tell us what it tells us.Where's that?

You know, where did the boat go?You know, things related more to science and objectivity.That's what I want.I want to hear more being done.That's a red flag.

Going back to the DNA on the boat, allegedly that boat was white.that night.It was wiped before Nolan's body was discovered.Now, we do know this for a fact.Several of Nolan's friends deleted their social media accounts.What legal significance does that have?

Yeah, so first to the point of the boat being wiped, I don't want to give a CSI lesson here.I don't want to tell people how to be better at covering up evidence, but DNA is very tricky.Blood is very tricky.It's not as easy as I wiped it and I can't see it.You know, it's as easy as black lights, but it's as complicated as, you know, the DNA on a molecular level, it stays, it's, I'm not going to give away what I've seen done to more successfully, uh, get rid of evidence.Right.

But wiping it down typically is not enough.I'll leave that at that.Um, and I'm sorry, what was the second question?The second point?

Well, I was saying what legal significance does.

Oh yes.So the significance goes to the motive, the reason, right.Um, What I've read, what I've heard, and I will say I've seen other cases here is there have been statements by the people who have deleted their accounts that it was a consequence of them getting death threats.When you're in the media, you know, when our names are here, everyone feels they can reach out and say hello.You know, I get all kinds of phone calls, text messages.Some are encouraging, some are less than thrilled with what I do online.

And people feel like they can just say what they want to say to you.I can tell you in my profession, death threats are a thing.And these are, these are people who up until now were living private life.You and I, we put ourselves out there, right?We were in the public domain, but these people were living private lives.Their social media was for their friends and family to enjoy life.

And it, if you believe why they did it again if you believe that what they said what they've said is they took it down becausethey were just getting so literal death threats, literal, just the negativity, people reaching out and threatening harm.And if that is the case, that is a legitimate reason to want to step back.Now the question becomes before they did that, was there anything that could have raised a red flag.Um, I don't know what efforts were made either by law enforcement or Mr. Crump's third party independent investigation to, to screenshot this, that stuff.Um, and there are ways to contact meta, which is, you know, Facebook, Instagram now and YouTube and try to, you know, it's like our phones, when we delete it on the outside, we think it's gone.

Many of these smartphones now, they keep everything just because you and I hit the delete button.There are ways to go in.It's in the core memory.A lot of stuff is still there.So if you obtain the devices that the screenshots were on, or you write to the company, there are ways to salvage what was there.So again, I try to be Open as to why they did it, you know, these are people that up until now.

I don't know the students I don't know they have criminal histories or not if they had other Unsavory comments on their media or not, you know, that's always a possibility.You know, I did not grow up in this digital age.So You know people forget what they say online from two years ago, and maybe it wasn't the nicest most You know mature thing to say and then that can get blown out of proportion I'm more concerned about whatever existed from the Dayton question.That's why we know if these people had something two years ago, unless it was two years ago, they had a beef with Nolan.I've not heard that.I'm not putting it out there, but I want to know about what existed July 4th, July 3rd, July 5th, that 48, 72 hour period.

Um, the accounts themselves, we're here talking about it.It's, it's, it's emotionally charged.It's hard for anyone to get that on a day to day.So.Again, I tried to pace myself in, in judging why a civilian who did not actually part of this, who just happened to be an 18 year old at a party, um, one of these students, and you may want to touch on this.That was there.

His mother is a judge, right?And now she was getting scrutiny and that's impacting her ability to be a judge.You know, now she's getting this, you know, she's not on the case.Questions will be raised as to the fact that a.A witness's mother is in the judiciary, and did she have any play?Because there is evidence that that son made an initial call when Nolan's whereabouts were at the very least unknown and maybe more, right?

He called his mom.His mom reported to law enforcement.His mom's an attorney, by justice, an attorney, right?And I know what I would do for my son or daughter if that son my child was being looked at, right or wrong.It's not about guilt or innocence, it's about knowing the law, knowing what our rights are.We always tell other people as an accused, you know, a defendant is an accused, you know, I've not been, I'm still innocent under the law and everyone has a right not to talk to law enforcement.

We talk about this a lot on the other side of things.You don't have to talk to them.If you're innocent, don't talk to them.They're not there for your innocence.They're there to lock you into a story, right?And as an attorney, I would always tell you, anyone don't go to police, talk to me, let me call the police.

Right.So you're seeing a lot of people circle the wagons.Maybe they got some legal advice on that.Right.I can say as an attorney, that's the advice I would give.Right.

Um, and so you may feel they should be talking that they're hiding.Maybe they are, maybe they're not.But innocent people have the same rights as guilty people, and we don't know which is which.So there are questions there with that.

Well, the judge injected herself in this case publicly.When she made that public statement, she put herself in the direct line of fire.So she ain't getting no break from me as far as people scrutinizing her because she put herself out there like that.Her son was involved in some type of way.At the very least, he's associated with the case.He was with Nolan.

prior to Nolan's death.Now, I'm going to tell you the way that I'm built.Man, if my friend is hanging out with me and ends up dead, I'm speaking on it.Law enforcement is just going to have to come do whatever the hell they got to do, because I'm not killing my friend.So they're going to have to just do whatever the hell they got to do.I'm not I'm not running hiding, man. I'm not going to delete my social media.

I ain't scared of these motherfuckers, man.You know what I'm saying?I'm not going to delete my social media and hide.I'm going to jump on that.And I ain't saying I'm going to go back and forth with people.I ain't saying I'm going to do all of that.

But at the very least, I am going to say, all right,I .P.Nolan Wells, my dog.Post a picture of my partner.Say what the hell you want to say.

I can't control you uncivilized mutts.Say whatever the hell you want to say.But that's my dog.And I'm going to speak on it.I'm letting you know that's my partner.I'm not even thinking about getting prosecuted and all this type of stuff, man. I'm doing what comes natural when a person is grieving, when a person has a loved one who has been lost.

I'm grieving.Man, I'm going to salute my partner.I'm going to pay tribute.And maybe people wouldn't be so suspicious if they didn't Totally delete the accounts if they would have just turned off the comments because they could have done that they could have just turned Or private them or made them private So that makes me think that makes me think they have something to hide and then furthermore What do you think about the fact that the friends?held on to Nolan's phone and his car keys and did not give them to the parents voluntarily.The parents had to go and hunt them down to retrieve those keys and his cell phone.

So before I come to that, if you could refresh my recollection, the family ultimately got it back, not directly from the friends, but through law enforcement efforts.You got it from the friends?

First of all, law enforcement ain't had no efforts.The family been doing all the work.The family been doing all the investigating.Hell, they need to give the family a damn law enforcement check at the end of the month.Whenever they get paid, they need to make sure they shoot the the Worsley family over something, too, because they they've been doing all the damn investigating.The mother tracked.

the phone.The daddy tracked the keys.The mother tracked down the phone and got the phone from one of the friends.And then the father went to the house of another friend who was actually sleeping like a baby, I think, when after he got the news that his friend was missing, he slept.So look, man, I don't know how these people are set up.I don't know how their brains are set up.

I don't know how their hearts are set up.I don't know what type of energy they got.But if I got a friend that go missing, man, it's going to be hard for me to get some sleep, especially the first day that I heard that he was missing.That's going to be hard for me to get some sleep.So there's a lot of inconsistencies and when you look at the fact that they held on to those keys and that phone, if it's my friend, I got the phone, I got the keys.First thing I'm going to do is call mom, I'm going to call dad.

Hey, I got his key.Here you go.Here you go.I got it.Here you go.That's what I'm going to do.

I think the answer could come from the question I had earlier, which was, We know at least one attorney, the judge, the mom was involved.How much did these children get spoken to or legally advised?Because I hear what you're saying as a friend, right?I have clients that are passionate like you for their friends all the time.And sometimes your path, what you feel is right morally, right?We'll go against what I advise for you legally, because it's not about, I don't want what's right for Nolan.

If you are my client, I need what's best for Willie, right?Even if Willie feels it's not fair,I need to look out for your interests.And if you want to say Nolan was my kid, right, that's my boy, and RIP, great.I don't want you, you're paying me to protect you.Let me protect you.

Blame me, blame the lawyer.My lawyer, Willie G, you've got how many million followers, right?Why are you saying something?My lawyer will yell at me if I talk anything about it.My lawyer's told me I'm not allowed to talk about it, right?And that's his legal advice, and that's why he does what he does.

I want to, I will one day.I've been instructed.My lawyer's going to be so mad at me if I talk about it.He's going to chew my ear off.That's what I tell clients.It's not about, I'm here for you.

I'm not against no one.I got young kids, it's tragic.No one, 18 years old, in college, this guy had his whole life ahead of him, he was in football.This kid was gonna do big things.Like, I can't imagine, I cannot imagine.These kids like this hurt me.

But as an attorney, I'm telling you, I will give you a legal reason why, if any of those children were my clients, I would tell them, you don't touch that phone.I do not want your fingerprints to be the last ones on that phone.Because where does that put you?The last one to touch Nolan's phone.And that puts you one step closer to being the last one with Nolan.Whether you did something or not, you know, I don't want your, after the fact, involvement in evidence, the phone's evidence.

You know, I think we all went to something.It's an approval of something.I don't want any more people involved in it than they already were up to the point it happened.You know, we've discussed or we have, it's been said that.family believes there could be a cover -up.Well, what's one of the best ways to do a cover -up?

You take that phone and you do something with it, right?If I'm the attorney for any of the kids, I'm saying, I am telling you, don't do anything.Don't touch anything.That's for law, you're on the cop.That's for law enforcement.If you want to tell them, the phone is over there on top of the Xbox.

I read Nolan was believed to have left it in the house.The keys are on the top of the Xbox.Okay.And they were both, the question was, why was he with them near the water?We can get into that.But I am telling my clients, if you want to tell them, keys are over there and the phone's over there.

Great.Don't touch it.Think of it like a dead body.If you're walking down the street, you see a dead body.If you ask me, what do I do?You don't touch that body, Willie.

Please, call the police.Tell them where the body is. I don't want your fingerprints to be the last ones on that thing.

Well, you ain't got to tell me about that part.

But it's the same deal.We change what it is. I understand that.Listen, I don't fault the family at all.I don't ever want to be in their shoes, but I think if they got counsel, you don't involve yourself.You can share what you know, share where things are, you leave it to law enforcement.

The DA said that she was going to bring the case to the grand jury.Now, walk us through what that looks like, because a lot of people are under the impression that once it goes to a grand jury, that meansthey got a suspect.That means somebody going to jail, like somebody at least going to trial.So walk us through the process of a case being presented to the grand jury.

Great question.And this is where I think you could have very real concerns about race coming into play.And I'll get to that in a moment.This is where I think it becomes real.So not every state has a grand jury process.Uh, and some states have it in different forms.

Florida, uh, does not New York does.I've been practicing both as a prosecutor, many grand juries, a grand jury that you can think of at first like a jury panel.Usually it's up to about 18, 24 people and they are a sequester that they can go home at night, but they are a private jury panel.And for usually two to three weeks, every day they come to the state attorney's office, they sit in a room and they wait for felony attorneys to present cases to see if there's probable cause to go forward with the prosecution.It's not beyond a reasonable doubt.Does the state have a good faith base enough here, probable cause to bring this, to continue to indict this person or persons for this crime or crimes, and to go forward.

Typically, defendants, suspects, do not have access to the grand jury.It's strictly for the prosecutors, one -sided, to give evidence to members of your community, your peers, evidently, right?That's why I said the comment before.So your peers, your community, people you go to the store with, and they're gonna decide if there's enough.Defendants can elect to testify in a grand jury, but they know nothing of what goes on before it for the fact.Okay.

And one of the, depending on your viewpoint, when it's a grand jury, if the grand jury decides a no true bill, which is there's not enough evidence, the case dies right there.And the prosecutor, whatever you're thinking, I'm going to say it wasn't my decision.It's not my fault.Your community, your peers decided there wasn't enough.And if they said there is enough prosecutors say it wasn't my decision.the community, a jury of your peers has decided there is enough to indict you on these felony charges.

And we are not going to proceed with that charges against you.Um, and so that's how, so what the grand jury will do is the prosecutor's office, the prosecutor will over time, they don't have to do it in a day.They have the full panel length.So there'll be several weeks to present evidence.And then at the end, they'll ask the jury to vote in private, uh, by majority, um, Does the state attorney's office have enough to proceed with this case?And they will vote yes or no.

And if the prosecutor's office wants their best chance for a true bill, which is to indict, is to present as much evidence as possible.And so we go back to getting the forensics done, getting the autopsy done, getting the analysis of the boat done, all this stuff, because the jury, the grand jury, can come back with questions.The prosecutor's limited in how he can answer it, he or she.They can't answer directly, they want to answer it with evidence, or to say, or to present another witness, or to say, you gotta remember the testimony.But it's the jury panel that will decide if this, if anyone, or multiple get charged with certain crimes.And the prosecution can say, we think it's premeditated murder, manslaughter, reckless manslaughter, you know, boating vehicular death with recklessness.

And the grand jury can pick any of the charges that are presented to them.That's where I think you're going to see.And we won't know, or we're not supposed to know, the makeup of the grand jury.So we don't know if it was all men, no women, all white, no black.We don't get to know that.It's supposed to be a random jury process.

It's supposed to be random.

Yeah, you know what I don't like about this grand jury, which I call a clan jury, because it's typically white folks.These grand juries are typically white folks, and they get to decide who even ends up getting prosecuted, and who don't?They can just say, hey, we don't want that case.We're going to take that.We're going to take that.And the prosecutor gets to only answer the questions.

The defense attorney don't get to say nothing about it.And also, we don't get to know what evidence was presented to the grand jury.We're in the dark.The public is totally in the dark.And that's fundamentally flawed to me, man.That is something great.

Like, who in the hell approved that?Who thought that that was a good idea?You know, that's a horrible idea.It's a horrible way, horrible way to administer so -called justice.One other question I got to ask you is the grand jury.Is the grand jury

So they can't outright say, we want more evidence.But let's say from the evidence provided, they'll come back with a question.And the best way to answer that question is to provide more evidence if it's available.So they can't just say, I want to see the autopsy record.They could say, What did the autopsy records show?And the prosecutor either say, it's a great question.

We're not done yet.I'll see you tomorrow.Go get that presented to them.Or they can say, ladies and gentlemen, you need to rely on the evidence that's been presented to you.So the jury can ask them anything they want, but they don't get direct answers.And the prosecutor can't explain anything to them.

They're going to say, look, all I can do is show you evidence, give you testimony, show you exhibits.you need to interpret that for yourself.I can give you legal, I can give you the instruction in the law or what, or what you're told how to interpret certain things, but I cannot explain it to you.

Yeah.Well, ladies and gentlemen, Jack Paul, Mary, look, man, I appreciate you coming on the show.You have shared a lot of light on this case and man, you know, I'm probably going to have you back on there real soon, man, because This case is, it's got a lot of twists and turns to it.And I know that it's going to continue to be polarizing.So absolutely.Thank you for your wisdom.

Thank you for coming on the show, man.Ladies and gentlemen.Thank you so much, man.

You flatter me.It was my pleasure.I'm at your leisure.

There you go.Appreciate you, man.No more talk.