When Jill Wells died March 28, 2001, it was seemingly an open-and-shut case – a terrible accident at the hands of her 6-year-old son.
That was the story Jill’s husband, Mike Wells, told authorities in Lincoln County after she was shot in the head and killed at a remote ranch, and the coroner and sheriff quickly accepted that version of events and wrapped up their investigation.
There were a lot of things that weren’t done that day that are routine in cases like that, beginning with an autopsy.
LONG READ: Blame: Was the death of Jill Wells an accident ... or murder?
Now, after a year-long 9Wants to Know investigation, there are numerous questions about what exactly happened the day Jill died.
And about other similar cases, where coroners closed the books on deaths without performing autopsies.
The result of that investigation is laid out in BLAME, a 9Wants to Know special report.
