Former 'Bachelor' Chris Soules addresses lingering questions about fatal crash

Chris Soules, the former "Bachelor" star who received two years' probation in August for his part in a fatal crash, addressed lingering questions Thursday about what happened that night in April 2017.

The farmer and real-estate entrepreneur, 37, told Michael Strahan on "Good Morning America" that after the pickup truck he was driving on an Iowa road crashed into a tractor that had no lights on, killing 66-year-old Kenneth Mosher, "I'm basically coming to inside of one of our pickups. … All I remember is waking up and just saying, 'I need help.' That's all I knew, was something bad had happened and I needed help."

With others gathering at the scene, Soules called 911 and made his way to Mosher in a ditch nearby. "I began administering CPR," he said, "doing chest compressions," the counting of which is audible in the publicly released recording of that call. Before police arrived, Soules left in a truck that had been driven there by one of his employees.

"I don't know that I was thinking clearly," Soules said when asked why he left. "I notified the authorities of what had happened, the paramedics were there, but I know I was scared and wanted to be in a safer place. I just went home." When Strahan suggested some might think leaving meant he had had something to hide from police, Soules insisted, "No, I had nothing to hide, honestly."

While cans of alcoholic beverages were found in his truck, Soules stated, "I was not drinking that night. I mean, the fact is the truck is not mine. It's not even in my name. We employ over 15 people and those cans could have been anybody's. There were four witnesses that swore under oath that they saw no evidence of me appearing to be intoxicated or under the influence of any sort of drug or alcohol."

He added, "I was never charged with causing the accident. I was charged with leaving the scene of a serious-injury accident. A man did die and … it was a tragedy. My sentence is living with this for the rest of my life."

Soules had given People magazine a largely identical account in an interview posted Sept. 4.

Initially charged with the felony Leaving the Scene of a Fatal Accident, Soules in November pleaded guilty to the aggravated misdemeanor Leaving the Scene of an Accident Resulting in Serious Injury. He received a two-year suspended prison sentence and two years' probation. He previously settled a wrongful-death suit by the Mosher family, paying $2.4 million.