Dau Mabil

Case background and investigation

Dau Mabil escaped Sudan's civil war as a child and came to Jackson, Mississippi, in 2000 as one of the 'Lost Boys' of Sudan, part of a group of about 50 boys resettled with the help of Catholic Charities, St. Andrew's Episcopal Church and Millsaps College. By 2024 the 33-year-old was living in Jackson's Belhaven Heights neighborhood with his wife, Karissa Bowley, working as a restaurant manager and planning to return to school for a computer science degree. On March 25, 2024, around midday, Mabil texted his wife that he was going for a walk along his usual route toward downtown and left home without his phone. Surveillance video captured him near Jefferson Street, between Fortification and High streets, at about 12:15 p.m., wearing an orange shirt, yellow hoodie and blue Adidas joggers. He was never seen alive again.

His disappearance in broad daylight, along a trail connecting the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum with other city landmarks, prompted community searches and national attention. The Mississippi Capitol Police, which patrols the district where he vanished, led the investigation. On April 13, 2024, fishermen spotted a body in the Pearl River in Lawrence County, roughly 60 miles south of Jackson; officials confirmed days later that the remains were Mabil's. Lawrence County Sheriff Ryan Everett said early on that there was no evidence of foul play, a conclusion Mabil's brother, Bul Mabil, rejected.

The death set off a legal dispute within the family. On April 18, 2024, Hinds County Chancery Judge Dewayne Thomas issued a restraining order preventing release of the body until an independent autopsy could be performed, after Bul Mabil sought to block any cremation. In May 2024 the judge ruled that Bowley, as surviving spouse, was next of kin with authority over the remains, dismissing Bul Mabil as a plaintiff for lack of standing, while Bowley agreed that an independent autopsy could proceed at the brother's direction and expense. The state medical examiner's autopsy, released in June 2024, found the cause of death was drowning with the manner undetermined and identified no external trauma or injury that could account for the death.

Rumors that a video showed Mabil being abducted circulated widely. Capitol Police Chief Bo Luckey called the claim 'absolutely false and inaccurate,' saying the footage had been sent to the FBI for enhancement and that analysts found nothing suspicious in it. According to Mississippi Today, Capitol Police closed their investigation in 2024 having found no evidence of homicide. The NAACP and U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson nonetheless called for a federal Justice Department review, with the NAACP arguing the state's preliminary no-foul-play conclusion should not be accepted and family members saying Capitol Police had not been 'fair and forthcoming.'

An independent autopsy commissioned by Bul Mabil, performed by pathologist Dr. Daniel Schultz and released in February 2025, reached the same conclusion: drowning, manner undetermined. Schultz wrote that homicide was 'excluded from reasonable consideration' given the absence of significant internal or external trauma, leaving accident or suicide as reasonable possibilities, and found the abduction claim unsupported. Dau Mabil was buried in February 2025, nearly a year after he vanished. His brother has said he intends to hire a private investigator and another forensic pathologist, and questions about how Mabil ended up in the Pearl River remain unresolved.