EXCLUSIVEFirst cop to arrive at chilling scene where Oklahoma teen Noah Presgrove was mysteriously found dead reveals what he saw - and new details about eerie 911 calls
A teenager who was mysteriously found dead on a lonely highway had very little blood around his body despite his horrific injuries, the first cop on the scene says.
Noah Presgrove, 19, was wearing only 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 the Labor Day weekend that was heavily documented on social media.
Jefferson County Undersheriff Jimmy Williams was the first policeman to arrive at the scene after two motorists saw the body and called 911.
Noah Presgrove, 19, was wearing only shoes when his body was discovered on a desolate stretch of US-81 in Terral, Oklahoma, on September 4
Williams arrived at 6:18 am, about half an hour after the emergency calls at 5:43 am and 5:48 am, and investigated Presgrove's body.
He only took a brief look before focusing on securing the area but told DailyMail.com there was not enough blood for it to be starkly noticeable.
'I didn't observe a lot [of blood] from what little I was there checking – once we determined he was in fact dead, I was just securing the location,' he said.
Williams couldn't say if there was more or less blood than you would expect from Presgrove's injuries, as he was not a medical expert, but it was not an obvious amount.
His observations aligned with Tyler Hardy, the first driver to stop at the scene, Presgrove's best friend, Jack Newton, and others who said there was very little blood around the teen's body.
A medical expert told DailyMail.com that with the injuries detailed in Presgrove's autopsy report, there would have been a lot of blood at the scene.
Many friends, family, and locals believe Presgrove didn't die where he was found and was instead killed somewhere else and his body dumped on the highway.
Presgrove's body was found between the two chalk lines, and teeth within the circles. In the background is a memorial set up for the teenager
Presgrove's body was found about a mile north along the highway from the small street where the party was held
Williams also said Presgrove was not lying in the fetal position, as some people who saw the body recalled.
'He was laying somewhat on his side, but I wouldn't say he was in a fetal position, no,' he said, saying his legs were straight and his arms not tucked into his body.
The undersheriff said there were only five people at the scene when he arrived, and he was joined by Sheriff Jeremie Wilson six minutes later at 6:24 am.
Along with the two motorists who called 911 were two Terral Rural Volunteer Fire Department officers, including its chief, who arrived at 6:15 am, and Newton.
Williams said from when he arrived to when he left at 8:17 am, only the sheriff and Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers came to the scene.
'We kept traffic moving except for people who needed to be there… not long after OHP arrived we shut the road down completely,' he said.
Confronting photos of police chalk outlines showed where his body, marked by the white line, and at least one of his teeth, marked by the circle, were found
The sheriff's department released audio of the 911 calls on Monday, and Williams cleared up some unanswered questions about them.
The two callers were Gulfmark Energy field supervisor Tyler Hardy, and a semi-truck driver also named Tyler, who didn't give his last name to the 911 operator.
Three calls were placed from the area, but one of them was just 20 seconds of static that Williams said was Hardy on a bad signal.
'He had a bad connection and he to re-call. I confirmed it was the same phone number,' he said.
The first call, at 5:43 am, was from Tyler, whom Hardy earlier said was a trucker for Oklahoma Petroleum Allies who turned around in Terral, about two miles south, and came back to the scene.
'I had a bunch of cars behind me, but it looks like someone got hit, like somebody walking down the highway, [they are] lying on the shoulder in the road,' he said.
'Yeah, like on the shoulder, like maybe they were walking and somebody hit them… unless it was a deer, but it looked like a body.'
The dispatcher assured Tyler that she would have an officer respond to the situation, and then said Sheriff Wilson was on his way.
Before the call ended, Tyler remarked that the scene 'looked awful odd.'
Gulfmark Energy field supervisor Tyler Hardy (pictured with his wife Mallory) was the first known person to find Presgrove's body, and called 911 at 5:48 am
Presgrove with his sister Maddison Rawlings
Hardy, who was one of the cars behind Tyler, pulled over next to Presgrove and called 911 at 5:48 am, immediately trying again after his first call failed.
'I was driving to work south of Terral, and I am pretty sure someone is lying dead on the side of the road,' he said.
'They look naked, I’m staying back.'
The dispatcher told him that a deputy was heading toward the scene to address the situation.
Hardy responded that he was parked in the middle of the road, so he could prevent other motorists from driving over the body.
'I am sitting here blocking the road. The body is lying right on the white line... I turned around because I just about hit it,' he said.
'At first, I thought it was a deer, and I was talking to a guy I work with and said, "I don't think that is a deer."'
Hardy then told the dispatcher that 'it actually looks like there's a piece of clothing lying in the middle of the road'.
'I don’t want to get too close… I’ll just go ahead and make sure nobody runs it over or anything else,' he said.
There was one extensive skull fracture running across his head, 'splitting the middle base of skull into two', and two smaller ones, with police investigators describing his head as being 'caved in'. The large fracture is known as a 'hinge type' for its distinctive shape. Presgrove also suffered damage to a muscle on the side of his head, which is used for chewing
The skull fractures and scalp tearing caused bleeding inside his head both above and below the skull. The most was at the back of his head in what's known as a subdural hemorrhage - below the dural layer under the skull that carries fluid around the cranium - where there was 20ml, or 0.68oz, of blood pooled. There was also air in both his cranial cavity and spinal cord, extremely rare conditions only caused by massive head trauma
The clothing was a pair of white shorts, according to the autopsy report, that some of Presgrove's friends said he was last seen wearing.
Williams said by the time he arrived, the shorts were folded near Presgrove's body, as they were described in the autopsy report.
It is believed the shorts were retrieved and folded by one of the volunteer firefighters in the few minutes between Hardy's call and Williams arriving, to prevent vehicles running them over.
Hardy last month said no one touched the body between when he saw it, and when police arrived.
'I was the one who found the body so yes I can say 100 percent that nobody messed with Noah, I was the first person there,' he said.
'I know who and what I saw.'
The married father-of-two was driving south in darkness to an early shift when he spotted something in the headlights of his Ford F-150 work pickup truck.
He pulled over to take a closer look and realized he was looking at the body of a young man, dead by the side of the road.
Presgrove is believed to have died from massive internal bleeding before his other injuries had a chance to end his life. All up, he lost at least 3.2 pints of blood from two punctured lungs, damage to vital organs, and extensive tissue damage. A man Presgrove's size has about 12.6 pints of blood, and would generally die after losing half of it - though as little as a third can lead to death
Presgrove was a high school football player until his graduation in May
Hardy said Presgrove's body was lying on its side, totally naked except for mismatched shoes, with a pair of shorts lying on the road about 25ft away.
Crucially, Hardy said there was very little blood at the scene despite the teenager's massive upper-body injuries, including three skull fractures.
'I called it in and so did the truck driver, we were on the phone with them at the same time,' he said.
'We did not leave the scene until around 10 am and nobody was messing with anything.'
Less than 10 minutes after both he and the truck driver called 911, Presgrove's best friend Jack Newton arrived.
'Jack was the only person who walked up to to Noah, and he told me who it was, until the Terral fire and Jefferson County Sheriffs showed up,' Hardy said.
Jack also told DailyMail.com that there was minimal blood at the scene - only a little coming out of his ears and on the top of his head where part of his scalp was torn away to the bone.
Presgrove (center) with his father Victor (left) and mother Kasey (right)
He called and broke the new to his father Caleb Newton about 6:05 am, who hurried to the scene about 40 minutes down the highway from his home in Comanche.
Jack said he woke up ready to go fishing and was told his best friend was missing.
'I figured maybe he got a ride or something, Noah's done that before - got mad and left,' he told DailyMail.com.
'He was not one you usually worry about. I wasn't really thinking about it.'
Jack was supposed to go fishing with his father that day and texted him at 5.53am - coincidentally the same time as the 911 call - letting him know he was on his way.
'I'll meet y'all at the lake. Can you bring me a hat please... Someone messed with mine after I went to bed,' he wrote. Caleb replied 'ok'.
Jack assumed Presgrove was fine and left for the lake, driving north until he saw the semi-trailer and pickup by the side of the road.
Jack Newton, Presgrove's best friend, arrived soon after Hardy and the truck driver found the body and called 911
Jack texted his father, Caleb Newton, at 5.53am letting him know he was on his way
Oklahoma Chief Medical Examiner Leonardo Roquero ruled Presgrove died of 'multiple blunt force injuries', but how he got them was 'undetermined'.
His autopsy report released on May 13 detailed extensive injuries to the teen's upper body, including 10 broken ribs, serious skull, neck, and spine fractures, internal bleeding, brain and organ damage, and cuts and grazes all over his body.
There was one extensive skull fracture running across his head, 'splitting the middle base of skull into two', and two smaller ones, with police investigators describing his head as being 'caved in'.
Roquero wrote that there were 'no vehicle parts or debris observed on the scene', indicating Presgrove was almost certainly not hit by a car.
'He was naked and was only wearing unmatching shoes. There was a pair of shorts found several feet from the decedent and was reported to be his,' Roquero wrote.
'Additionally, there were three pieces of a white metal chain as well as part of a tooth present several feet from the decedent.'
Roquero noted there was 'a drawing in black ink of a stick-figure person on the side of the right thigh'.
The shorts he was wearing were undamaged, despite the grazes on his buttocks, and the slip-on shoes had grass and other debris lodged in them.
Presgrove had a blood alcohol level of 0.14, but no drugs in his system.
Confronting photos of police chalk outlines showed his teeth were found scattered across the highway, some a dozen feet from his body.
Leaked text messages and unearthed social media comments from Presgrove's friends revealed conflicting accounts of the teen's final hours.
The rough series of events that emerges is that after two nights or particularly heavy partying, Presgrove and several others took an ATV for a drunken spin and flipped it.
Presgrove's best friend Jack Newton, who insists he was asleep when the teenager died, summarized the basic chain of events to a friend weeks after the party
No one was hurt, but he was dirty enough that two of his friends gave him a shower and he changed into a different pair of shorts, and argued with the birthday girl about whether he could sleep in her bed.
After being told no, he wandered off to clear his head and wasn't seen again until a passing motorist spotted his body and called 911.
Newton, who insists he was asleep when Presgrove died, summarized it to a friend weeks after the party.
'All of all close friends said that he wrecked my SXS I had there around 3,' he wrote.
'And he was super dirty and super drunk so a couple of girls helped him in the shower.
'When he got out [of the shower] he wanted to sleep in one of the girls' bed and she [said no and] that upset him and he walked off.'
But the details are very much in debate - as is whether Presgrove was killed where he was found or even left the party alive.
