Widow denies any connection to death of Dau Mabil. Texts show a strained marriage

Court documents in the death case of Dau Mabil have revealed details of a strained relationship between Mabil and his wife Karissa Bowley.

In a Tuesday hearing to determine the status of Mabil's autopsy, emotions were high as Bowley was questioned about her husband's disappearance.

In the days leading up to when Mabil went missing, texts messages revealed Bowley’s concerns with Dau’s drinking and alleged verbal and physical abuse.

The findings were first mentioned by Lisa Ross, an attorney for Dau’s brother Bul Mabil, during a Tuesday hearing.

According to court records, the following message was sent from Bowley to Pamela Griffin on March 7:

“Dau is having a hard time, and he’s not ‘behaving’ for lack of a better term. He’s drinking a lot and just doesn’t treat me and our now-former housemate well... Oh yeah, I meant to say I’m staying with my mom and dad, near him, and I’m still in contact with him, just not staying in the house with him,” Bowley wrote.

Meanwhile, court records show Dau also told Griffin that he was considering leaving Bowley in a March 22 text, which was sent three days before his disappearance.

“Hey, I think I’m done with Karissa. She does not know how to control her emotions. So, I’m going to rework (sic) I’m figuring out things. It probably will be for the best,” Dau wrote.

Another text from Mabil stated that Bowley had been “listening to some feminist podcast almost all day every day, and she’s just been wanting to argue with me about any small thing. I told her I’m not doing that anymore. She’s been super struggling controlling her emotions and really starting to get to me. I can’t do that anymore.”

These messages became public more than a month after Mabil went missing in late March and weeks after his body was pulled from the Pearl River in Lawrence County on April 13.

According to Lawrence County Sheriff Ryan Everett, an autopsy revealed that no foul play was involved in his death. But Bul Mabil believes there was foul play.

Hinds County Chancery Judge Dewayne Thomas heard Tuesday arguments on whether he should modify or dissolve his April 18 injunction preventing the release of Dau Mabil’s remains until an independent autopsy could be conducted.

“I'm not here to chastise anyone. I'm here today to try and find out a proper solution to a problem that would now exist, and what needs to be done to show all parties who have an interest in the live and the unfortunate death of this man who all has been done to find a real and actual cause of this man's disappearance, in his untimely death,” Thomas said in the courtroom.

Bowley takes the witness stand

During the Tuesday hearing, both the plaintiffs and the defendant's side agreed on one question: What happened to Dau Mabil?

Attorney Ross called Bowley to the stand and proceeded to ask a line of questions regarding Bowley's involvement in the disappearance of Dau.

In addition to the text messages, Ross claimed that Dau and Karissa had a “blow up” at Sal and Mookie’s in the weeks before Dau went missing. The only details on the nature of the alleged argument shared in the courtroom was that Dau and a supervisor were having a conversation about “chivalry.”

Bowley said she could not recall this alleged discussion.

Ross also brought up the day Dau went missing on March 25.

Karissa previously told reporters Dau left his home in Belhaven Heights on March 25 and was last seen on video footage at 12:20 p.m. March 25 in the southbound direction on Jefferson Street, just north of High Street.

According to Bowley, Dau sent her a text message at 11:58 a.m. saying he was going on a walk and left his phone at home to charge. Bowley said this was not unusual. Bowley said she expected to hear from him by mid-afternoon March 25, but she didn't.

Ross questioned Bowley on this narrative asking, “So, help me understand Dau went walking without a phone, without an ID and without a bank card.”

“Yes,” Bowley said.

Paloma Wu, Bowley’s attorney, attempted to build back Bowley’s character in the courtroom by describing different search tactics Bowley employed in pursuit of Dau’s whereabouts.

Wu said the courtroom that Bowley organized "advertising campaigns" such as search parties, hanging missing person posters and driving around town. Wu also stated Bowley has approximately 120 calls and text messages to law enforcement between the day of Dau's disappearance and autopsy.

“Karissa’s only interest in this case is to support a thorough investigation into the circumstances surrounding her husband's death in order to discover the truth, and to ensure that anyone who is responsible for his death will be punished to the fullest extent of the law,” Wu said to the courtroom.

Wu went on to say that Bowley never opposed a third-party autopsy instead “embraces” one. Wu said that Bowley would support an independent autopsy but was never summoned to court to answer her brother-in-law’s complaint.

Bowley said when the court handed down the order, she still had not been informed that Dau had died and was continuing her search for him.

Wu asked Bowley at the witness stand, “Did you kill your husband?”

“No,” Bowley said.

Wu followed up by asking, “Did you put someone up to it?

“No, that's crazy” Bowley said.

This hearing comes after the Mississippi Department of Public Safety filed a motion April 26 asking Judge Thomas to dissolve the previous order he handed down on April 18, at the behest of Bul Mabil, who suspects foul play and compared Dau's death to the 1955 murder of Emmett Till.

Claire Barker, an attorney for the Department of Public Safety, said Thomas lacked jurisdiction in handing down the ruling, saying the order, as a result, is “void.”

According to court documents, Barker wrote that "relief cannot be granted to the plaintiff as a matter of law because he is not the next of kin and lacks the capacity to bring this claim."

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According to court documents filed on April 20, Bowley asked Thomas to amend his order, saying, as Mabil’s widow, she is his next of kin.

The state’s filing backs up Bowley’s contention, pointing to federal law that gives a spouse the priority to authorize the disposition of a person’s remains, followed by a surviving child who is 18 years or older, a grandchild who is 18 or older, a surviving parent, and then a surviving sibling who is 18 or older.

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Barker also said the Department of Public Safety was not notified of the April 18 hearing where the injunction was granted.

“Because of this fatal defect, the court has no personal jurisdiction over MDPS. The existence of personal jurisdiction… depends on the presence of reasonable notice to the defendant that an action has been brought,” Baker wrote.

Baker added that ordering injunctive relief against MDPS or any law enforcement agency “is improper if it seeks to interfere, impede or direct the manner in which the Mississippi State Medical Examiner conducts its investigation of a death affecting the public interest.”

Thomas said to the courtroom Tuesday that he will issue an order on the matter by Thursday afternoon.

This article originally appeared on Mississippi Clarion Ledger: Jackson MS: Dau Mabil case reveals texts before his disappearance