Overview of Christian Andreacchio
Was it suicide or murder?
There simply aren't enough words to describe the type of man Christian was or the type of person Christian could've become one day if only he had the opportunity. Christian was a family-centered, hardworking, loyal, ambitious, and generous young man who would do anything to make you smile or laugh, even on your darkest days. Christian had great ambitions, as explained by his mother in several interviews. His mother explains that Christian knew since day one that he wanted to work on a tugboat, a dream that he would achieve as soon as he turned 18. It wouldn't take long until Christian would move on to his next big goal, to become the youngest tugboat captain ever at the company he was working for, a goal that he was set to achieve.
Christian is described beautifully on the website of a non-profit dedicated in Christian's memory, Magnolia Son; a considerate guy who would send his mother pictures every few days of the sunrises and sunsets along the rivers he traversed, just so he could share the beauty with her". Christian is further described on the website by his friends as "a friend you would want to have your back. A friend who would fight for you when you couldn't fight for yourself. A friend who was generous and willing to give away a prized possession just because his friend needed it." Finally, Christian's coworkers described him lovingly as "a guy who would set his boots on fire to get a smile out of a coworker and friend," as well as someone who would try to make you laugh at all costs and as someone who worked hard but played harder. Christian loved riding dirt bikes, spending time out on a lake near his family's home, and spending time outside with his friends.
The Day Christian's Death
On the evening of February 25, 2014, Christian decided to leave the tugboat where he was working after receiving permission from his captain. Because his car was in Mississippi, where the boat had loaded three days earlier, Christian called his friend Justin late at night to ask him for a ride back to his apartment in Meridian. After Justin agrees and starts to get ready to leave his home, Christian calls him back and informs him that someone else would be picking him up, another friend of Christian's named Dylan.
Dylan arrives to pick Christian up around 8:00 am the following day, February 26, 2014, before the pair make the long drive back to Meridian, Mississippi. By 11:30, the pair arrive back at Christian's apartment, where his girlfriend, Whitley, is waiting. Christian and Whitley's relationship was very rocky from the beginning, as his family describes. According to his brother, Christian was planning on returning home and ending things once and for all with Whitley and had plans to kick her out of his apartment, where she had been living at the time.
After Christian and Whitley begin arguing shortly after their arrival, the trio watches a movie before Christian asks Dylan to run go to a local bank to withdraw all of the money out of his account and pick up some lunch for the group. Dylan quickly agrees and leaves to run the errands. During his time at the bank, where he is seen on security footage at 12:30 pm, Dylan is told that he cannot withdraw money from Christian's account simply because the account does not belong to him.
Once he returns, the group watches another movie before Christian and Whitley decide to go on a drive. After the couple returns a couple of hours later, and Dylan wakes up from a nap, he decides to go to a local Best Buy to look at their speaker selection. Before Dylan leaves, he retrieves Christian's gun from a hiding spot behind a curtain and returns it to him, reportedly telling Christian to "unload it and please don't touch it." Dylan had hidden Christian's gun previously because of an incident where Christian had reportedly held the gun up to his head.
While Dylan is out of the apartment, everything seems to take a turn for the worst. When he returns from Best Buy, Dylan looks for Christian around the apartment before reportedly finding him in the bathroom, slumped over the bathtub with a gunshot wound to the head. Panicked, Dylan calls 9-1-1 to report the apparent suicide. Shortly after, police begin arriving at the apartment, and Christian's death is quickly assumed to be a suicide, though the investigation continues.
One of Christian's neighbors would later tell police that he saw a gold Chevrolet or GMC truck parked at Christian's apartment and watched the truck leave before Dylan returns. Add this to Whitley's changing story, a strange crime scene without any blood spatter or blood at all outside of the bathtub, and several phone calls placed from Christian's cell phone after his death, and the suspicion, in this case, was only growing.
Where the investigation stands today
Whitley and Dylan would be arrested in January 2017 and put on trial in May of 2017. The grand jury indicted the pair, citing insufficient evidence at that point that they would require to convict and charge them for Christian's murder. What would follow includes several lawsuits and eventually an approval in 2019 for a request to be sent to the U.S. Department of Justice for a review of the previous investigation.
This year will be 8 years since Christian Andreacchio's suspicious death, and his family continues pushing for answers from police. There is currently a total of $100,000 being offered as a reward, gathered by the Culpable podcast, which is dedicated to Christian's case. The reward includes $50,000 for anyone who could bring forth new information which would lead to an arrest, and an additional $50,000 reward if the information leads to a conviction in Christian's case.
