The family of Noah Presgrove, found deceased along an Oklahoma highway, stated on Monday that the teenager had a caved-in skull, road rash on his hip, gravel rash on his shoulder, multiple bruises, and scattered teeth.
Presgrove, 19, was discovered lying dead, wearing nothing but shoes, along a rural stretch of US 81 in Jefferson County, Oklahoma, on Labor Day in 2023. His family mentioned that he was last seen alive at a party he attended with a group of friends.
Presgrove, a Comanche High School graduate, had plans to join the military before his disappearance after the multi-day party. His cousin Ashley Chadwick and aunt Robyn Smith shared more details provided by investigators.
“There was a wound to the back of his head, different skull fractures. He had broken ribs, all on the left side,” Smith said.
At the funeral home, Presgrove’s body was severely bruised and swollen, with his nose and cheek appearing broken, Smith stated. Chadwick mentioned that his fingertips looked “shredded,” as if he had been holding on to something for dear life.
“They said they didn’t think this was from a vehicle,” Smith said. “There was no indication of any injuries to the lower half of his body.”
Only one shoe found at the scene belonged to Presgrove, while the other belonged to a friend, the family said. Investigators noted that the injuries did not seem consistent with being struck by a vehicle.
Smith shared that one of Presgrove’s friends told them he wanted to go for a walk but couldn’t find one of his own shoes, so he took one of his shoes and one shoe belonging to another person at the party.
The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation described Presgrove’s death as “suspicious.”
Presgrove’s family hoped investigators with the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, the agency leading the investigation into the death, would help fill in some of the gaps. However, they were told something else by OHP investigators.
“They said they’re working on it, and they just want to keep it quiet,” his aunt Robyn Smith said. A medical examiner’s summary report states 19-year-old Noah Presgrove died of “multiple blunt force injuries.”
But the death of the Oklahoma teen, found by a highway patrol trooper on the side of the highway, wearing only his shoes on Labor Day 2023, remains shrouded in mystery. (Oklahoma’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner refers to Noah Presgrove as Noah Alexander Nichols, although the summary report.
In the one-page summary report, Dr. Leonardo Roquero checked the box “unknown” for Noah’s manner of death.
Noah’s brother, Dailen Presgrove, told News Nation he believes foul play was involved.
“He was in the fetal position. And his body was covered up,” Dailen told the outlet, adding: “You can see blood seeping through the covering. … As I’m looking at it, it just seems weird. The placement of the body. The tooth, the shorts. It doesn’t look like a hit-and-run.”
In September, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation said they were investigating Noah’s “suspicious death,” KFOR reported at the time.
After graduating high school, Noah planned to join the military, per News Nation. But after a party that lasted for days, the teenager went missing over the Labor Day holiday.
The medical examiner still does not know when – or for what reason – Noah was injured.
Noah’s body was found by an Oklahoma Highway Patrol trooper at 6:18 a.m. Monday, Sept. 4, 2023, per the summary report.
The medical examiner viewed his body the following day, per the summary report, and finalized the case Monday, April 29.
“Even if it was an accident, it doesn’t matter, come clean,” Noah’s cousin, Avery Poucher, told KSWO. “It hurts not to know. It’ll hurt knowing, but it hurts more not to know, and wondering, and just thinking every night what happened?”
A teenager had his skull caved in, fingers torn up, and teeth knocked out before he died of internal bleeding on a roadside hours after vanishing from a party.
Noah Presgrove, 19, was wearing only his shoes when his body was discovered on a desolate stretch of US-81 in Terral, Oklahoma, on September 4.
He was last seen alive about a mile away at a four-day 22nd birthday party with friends over the Labor Day weekend that was heavily documented on social media. Confronting photos of police chalk outlines showed his teeth were found scattered across the highway, some a dozen feet from his body.
Farther away still is a spot of blood - the only blood found at the scene despite the extensive injuries all over his upper 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. Instead, he died of internal bleeding in his torso, where he had several broken ribs and deep bruising on his left side.
The teenager's body also had what looked like road rash on his left shoulder and hip, and his fingers were torn up as if he were desperately clinging to something.
Oklahoma Highway Patrol detectives, who are leading the investigation, are still unsure how he died and were told conflicting stories about that night.
Theories include him being 'forcibly pushed from the bed of a moving truck' where the blood spot was, and staggering along the road before collapsing.
Presgrove could also have been killed in an accident or murdered elsewhere and his body dumped on the highway.
Initial belief that he was killed in a hit-and-run was ruled out based on the pattern of his injuries that didn't include any damage to his lower body.
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 raging party at the birthday girl's home, on a small street about a mile south from where his body was found, detailed in videos obtained.
One video from the night he died showed some of Presgrove's friends writing their names on his bare buttocks with a marker.
The writing was not still there when his body was discovered in the early hours of the morning, and it is unknown how and when it was removed.
Other photos show the teenager writing on the buttocks of another friend and posing alongside them with a signature on his chest.
Two more videos show Presgrove daring friends to slap him across the face as they partied under an outside patio at the house.
Presgrove had to repeatedly insist that a male friend hit him, eventually only giving him a light tap before sprinting away in fear of retaliation.
Another concerning photo appeared to show a teenager holding a rifle with Presgrove visible in the foreground. Presgrove's family complained his friends all claimed to have no idea what happened to him and how he ended up dead by the roadside just hours later.
The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation described his death as 'suspicious' days later, but few details have been released about the investigation.
Even Presgrove's family said they were in the dark and the Oklahoma Highway Patrol refused to provide any details to maintain the 'integrity of the investigation'.
'The longer you keep the truth inside, the guiltier you become… you could aid in getting justice for Noah,' his sister Madison Rawlings said.
'You could do the right thing and may receive a mercy that was not given to him, but the longer we sit in silence, the worse it becomes for you. I hope those involved see that we are not budging and the silence fuels our desire to know more.
'I miss Noah daily. This is the hardest chapter of my life, but I am thankful that I have a family that will not give up on each other.'
Presgrove's grandmother Deborah Smith also called on his friends to tell the whole story about what happened the night he died.
'When you think you have friends that you trust with all your heart and then here it comes. Sorry Noah that some of your true friends stabbed you in the back,' she said.
'A piece of my heart is missing and every day that goes by and Noah doesn't walk through the door and still no answer just takes another piece of my heart.'
His aunt Robyn Smith begged anyone with information to at least tell the police so his family would have answers seven months later.
'We lost an amazing young man to the horrible choices of others, please do not let us lose out on justice,' she said.
'We’ve heard so many different stories, but we have yet to hear the truth. The whole truth. Which we deserve.
'I know it’s scary and I know it’s hard, but we deserve to know what happened. Noah deserves to have his story told. We will not stop searching and asking. We will not stop demanding. It will come out.'
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