Oklahoma teen Noah Presgrove’s family reacts to his cause of death that ‘leaves a lot of things up in the air’

The family of an Oklahoma teenager found dead on the side of a highway has spoken out, saying his recently released autopsy leaves many questions surrounding his death unanswered.

Noah Presgrove, 19, was wearing only his shoes when his body was discovered on September 4 on a deserted stretch of US-81 near Terral, Oklahoma.

He was last seen alive about a mile away during a four-day 22nd birthday party with friends over Labor Day weekend that was extensively documented on social media.

An autopsy found the cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head and police said his death was no longer being investigated as a homicide, but the teen’s family feels they are still searching for answers.

‘There’s still a lot up in the air. An accident has occurred and we don’t know what that accident is, so the next approach is to find out how [it] played out,” his brother Dailen Presgrove countered PEOPLE.

“It makes no sense that the investigation has been going on for so long and that there were so many people around, and yet there is still so much uncertainty.”

“And there’s no point in a good person like Noah passing away in such a cruel and unknown way,” he said.

Photos of police chalk outlines showed his teeth were found scattered on the highway, about 30 feet from his body.

A bloodstain can still be seen further away – the only blood found at the scene, despite the extensive wounds all over his upper body.

Presgrove suffered severe 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,” the teen’s sister, Madison Rawlings, said PEOPLE. ‘I see the injuries, I just don’t know how [they were] causes.’

Although his cause of death has been determined, his cause of death remains under investigation, but a vehicle collision has been ruled out.

After nearly eight months of silence, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, which is leading the investigation, finally provided its first update since last September.

“Currently, the OHP is not investigating Presgrove’s death as a homicide,” the report said.

“The investigation is not over and anyone with information regarding Presgrove’s death is encouraged to get in touch [us].’

This was despite friends and family seeing his body saying his badly damaged face ‘looked like he had been beaten up by five guys’, DailyMail.com exclusively reported.

“No vehicle parts or debris were observed at the scene. “It is unknown at this time what happened to how the body was found on the road with multiple injuries,” the autopsy report said.

“Therefore, the manner of death is considered undetermined.”

The report’s summary also vaguely explained some of the events leading up to Presgrove’s disappearance and discovery on the highway.

‘He then rode with a number of men in an ATV ranger vehicle, during which a rollover incident occurred. The deceased was alive after the incident and returned to the party where he got into an argument with his girlfriend,” it said.

“The deceased left the house party and was not found on the side of the highway until the morning of September 4, 2023.”

Presgove’s best friend Jack Newton, who was at the party but claimed he was asleep when he disappeared, said it was his quad bike that was involved in the accident.

“All close friends said he destroyed my SXS I had there around 3am,” he wrote in a message to another friend.

“And he was super dirty and super drunk, so some girls helped him into the shower.”

Presgrove and his friends graduated from Comanche High School a few months earlier, and his family said he planned to join the military.

But that weekend, they drunkenly celebrated the end of summer with a wild party at the birthday boy’s home, on a small street about a mile south of where his body was found, as described in videos obtained by DailyMail.com.

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 no longer there when his body was discovered in the early morning hours, but it was not known how or when it was removed.

Other photos show the teen writing on another friend’s buttocks and posing next to them with an autograph on his chest.

Two more videos show Presgrove daring friends to punch him in the face as they partied under an outdoor patio at the home.

Presgrove had to repeatedly insist that a male friend hit him, eventually giving him only a light slap before sprinting away for fear of retaliation.

Another worrying photo showed a teenager holding a gun, with Presgrove visible in the foreground.