What We Know About Noah Presgrove’s Last Day Alive (Exclusive)

"Everybody I asked," says Noah's best friend, "will tell you a different story"

The mystery of what led to the death of 19-year-old Noah Presgrove seems to include more questions than answers despite the passage of nearly a year since the discovery of his battered, bloodied body beside a highway in rural Oklahoma.

But what has emerged from ongoing investigation, as well as public records and interviews with PEOPLE, is a timeline of Noah's final hours leading up his death in the early morning of Sept. 4, 2023, on a lonely stretch of Highway 81 outside of Terral, Okla.

The teen was found naked, the base of his skull had been split in two, his spine was fractured and an 8-inch head wound peeled back part of his scalp to the bone.

He was about a mile from a packed house party that he attended with friends the night before. An autopsy later confirmed that he died of severe blunt force trauma, but his manner of death — homicide, accident or otherwise — is still unknown.

While Oklahoma state police, who are continuing to investigate the death, have told PEOPLE that they don’t believe the Comanche, Okla., native was murdered, suspicions and speculation have continued to swirl in his community.

That's left his loved ones to try to dig for the truth while trying to clear up how he spent his final hours until eventually, hopefully, the moment of his death is revealed.

“Somebody knows something,” Noah’s older brother Dailen Presgrove, 24, tells PEOPLE in this week's cover story.

The family has launched its own investigation — and is working with a private investigator — to solve the heartbreaking case. “We won’t stop until Noah has justice,” Dailen says.

For more on Noah Presgrove's life and death and his family's search for answers, pick up this week's issue of PEOPLE or subscribe.

While some details remain in dispute, so far what the family knows for certain is that Noah, a gifted high school athlete, attended a rollicking Labor Day weekend party at the home of Avery Howard in Terral celebrating her 22nd birthday.

What had started as a loose gathering of longtime friends who'd grown up together turned into a much rowdier affair by the night before Noah was found dead.

Parts of the weekend were spent drinking and hog hunting on his best friend Jack Newton’s ATV. By Sept. 3, the number of people at the party had swelled, thanks to a social media blast.

Jack tells PEOPLE there were at most around three dozen attendees and many of the partygoers, including a group of teens and young adults from Texas, were strangers to Noah and his pals.

Noah’s sister Madison Rawlings, 23, who lives in Texas, didn’t attend the bash but remembers following the goings-on via social media and was struck that Noah was with some older partiers.

“I was like, ‘What the heck is he doing?’ ” Rawlings says.

Newton says that he went to sleep at 2 a.m. but later learned Noah had grabbed the keys to his ATV and gone for a ride with a group before the vehicle somehow tipped over. No one was visibly injured.

Noah then returned to Avery’s house, cleaned himself up and changed into a pair of his best friend's white wrestling shorts, according to Jack, who admits that there are conflicting recollections of the night.

For example, even a simple detail about how Noah got into the shower after the ATV incident isn't totally clear. "Everybody I asked," Jack says, "will tell you a different story."

Jack says he was later told that after showering, Noah became disgruntled by a disagreement with two female friends who felt he had gotten too close to them.

“I'm going to go cool off,” Noah apparently told another one of his friends, according to a version of events later relayed to Jack.

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One fact that seems to be undisputed is that Noah walked out the door around 3:30 a.m., after slipping into two mismatched shoes. He was never seen alive again.

"Their house is damn near half a mile from the road,” says Jack. “Nobody expected him to walk to the highway.”

By 3:41 a.m. a partygoer posted on Snapchat: “well noah is missing.” Two hours later — at 5:43 a.m. — two motorists on Highway 81 called 911 to report seeing a body along the road.

The sun hadn't yet crested the horizon when authorities arrived at the roadside around 6:15 a.m. and discovered Noah’s body, which they covered with a sheet.

Remnants of one his shattered teeth, along with a silver-plated chain necklace from his grandmother, lay scattered on the highway.

Law enforcement initially believed Noah was killed in some sort of a road accident, possibly a hit-and-run. But after examining the site more closely, their questions and suspicions only grew.

Some 10 months later, answers are elusive — spurring Noah's family to urge others to come forward, a plea repeated during recent demonstrations in southern Oklahoma.

“We’ve had other people hit before, and we can re-create it and make it make sense,” says Jefferson County sheriff Jeremie Wilson, who was one of the first responders on Sept. 4.

“This whole situation didn’t sit well with me.”

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