The family of an Oklahoma teenager found dead on the side of the road has spoken out, saying his newly released autopsy leaves many unanswered questions about his death.
Noah Presgrove, 19, was wearing only his shoes when his body was discovered on a desolate stretch of US-81 near Terral, Oklahoma, on September 4.
He was last seen alive about a mile away at a four-day 22nd birthday party with friends over Labor Day weekend that was widely documented on social media.
An autopsy declared his cause of death to be blunt force trauma to the head and police said his death was no longer being investigated as a murder, but the teen’s family feels they are still searching for answers.
“This still leaves a lot of things up in the air. An accident occurred and we don’t know what that accident is, so the next focus is to figure out how [it] “his brother Dailen Presgrove told PEOPLE.
Noah Presgrove, 19, was wearing only his shoes when his body was discovered on a desolate stretch of US-81 near Terral, Oklahoma, on September 4.
An autopsy declared the cause of death to be blunt force trauma to the head, but the teen’s family (pictured with his sister) said they are still searching for answers.
“It doesn’t make sense that the investigation has gone on for so long and there are so many people around and yet there is still so much uncertainty.”
“And it doesn’t make sense that a good person like Noah has disappeared in such a cruel and unknown way,” he said.
Photographs of police chalk outlines showed that his teeth were found scattered on the road, about three meters from his body.
Further away there is a blood stain, the only blood found at the scene despite the extensive wounds throughout the upper part of the body.
Presgrove suffered massive blunt force trauma to the back of his head, causing skull fractures but not killing him, according to correspondence with investigators shared with DailyMail.com.
“It’s strange,” said the teen’s sister, Madison Rawlings. PEOPLE. ‘I see the injuries, but I don’t know how [they were] caused.”
Although the cause of his death has been determined, his manner of death is still being investigated, but it has been ruled out that he was hit by a vehicle.
After nearly eight months of silence, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, which is leading the investigation, finally gave its first update since last September.
“Presgrove’s death is not currently being investigated by OHP as a murder,” he said.
“The investigation is not over and anyone with information regarding Presgrove’s death is asked to contact [us].’
Only a bloodstain was found at the scene despite extensive wounds throughout the upper body.
Photos of police chalk outlines showed that his teeth were found scattered on the road, about three meters from his body.
This was despite friends and family who saw his body saying his badly battered face “looked like he’d been beaten by five guys”, DailyMail.com exclusively reported.
‘No vehicle parts or debris were observed at the scene. “At this time it is unknown what happened as to how the body was found in the road with multiple blunt force injuries,” the autopsy report says.
“Therefore, the manner of death is considered undetermined.”
The summary of the report also vaguely explained some of the events that led to Presgrove’s disappearance and his discovery on the road.
‘He then rode an ATV ranger vehicle with several men who had a rollover incident. “The deceased was alive after the incident and returned to the party where he had an argument with his girlfriend,” he reads.
‘The deceased left the house party and was not found until the morning of September 4, 2023, on the side of the road.’
Presgove’s best friend Jack Newton, who was at the party but claimed he was asleep when he disappeared, said it was his all-terrain vehicle that was in the accident.
“All my close friends said he wrecked my SXS I had there around 3,” he wrote in a message to another friend.
“And he was super dirty and super drunk, so a couple of girls helped him in the shower.”
Presgrove and his friends graduated from Comanche High School just a few months earlier and his family said he planned to join the military.
But that weekend they were drunkenly celebrating the end of summer with a furious party at the birthday girl’s house, on a small street about a mile south of where her body was found, detailed in videos obtained by DailyMail.com.
Video from the night he died showed some of Presgrove’s friends writing on his body with a marker.
He was last seen alive at a four-day 22nd birthday party with friends over Labor Day weekend that was widely documented on social media.
A photo from the party appears to show a teenager holding a rifle with Presgrove visible in the foreground.
A video from the night she died showed some of Presgrove’s friends writing their names on her bare buttocks with a marker.
The writing was not yet there when his body was discovered in the early hours of the morning but it was not known how or when it was removed.
Other photographs show the teenager writing on another friend’s buttocks and posing next to him with a signature on his chest.
Two more videos show Presgrove daring his friends to slap him while they were partying under a patio outside the house.
Presgrove had to repeatedly insist that a friend hit him and finally only lightly punched him before running away for fear of retaliation.
Another disturbing photo appeared to show a teenager holding a rifle with Presgrove visible in the foreground.
