August 31st marked the 22nd anniversary of the 1997 car crash that tragically killed Princess Diana, who is still missed by her millions of fans to this day.

Diana was killed when the black Mercedes that she was riding in crashed into a concrete pillar outside the Pont de l’Alma tunnel in Paris, France as it fled the paparazzi. Also killed in the crash were driver Henri Paul and Dodi Fayed, Diana’s boyfriend. In fact, only one person made it out of that car alive, and that was Fayed’s bodyguard, Trevor Rees-Jones.

Rees (who later dropped Jones from his name) was sitting in the front seat of the car and was saved by an airbag. Unlike the other passengers in the vehicle, however, he was not wearing his seatbelt at the time. Though Rees made it out alive, he did not come out unscathed, as his face was crushed beyond recognition. It took 150 pieces of titanium to reconstruct his face, and Rees was put into a coma for ten days as doctors worked on that surgery. On top of that, he also was left with a broken wrist and chest injuries, and doctors said it was a miracle that he survived.

After the accident, conspiracy theories ran rampant, and Rees found himself being blamed by people who said he should have forced Diana and Fayed to wear seatbelts. Others said that Paul was visibly drunk, and that Rees should not have let him drive. Rees had difficulty defending himself because the head trauma he suffered caused amnesia, meaning he has little memory of the accident. Fayed’s father went so far as to accuse Rees of making up the amnesia because he was trying to hide his own guilt in the incident.

The scrutiny Rees faced led to him quitting his job and moving back in with his mother before he took a job at a sports store. He has given very few interviews over the years, though he did publish a book in 2000 called “The Bodyguard’s Story: Diana, the Crash, and the Sole Survivor.” In 2008, an official inquest cleared Rees of any wrongdoing and instead concluded that Paul’s drunk driving and speeding were to blame for the accident.

Rees went on to work in Iraq, but he has since moved back to the United Kingdom with his wife. He now reportedly works as a security consultant and plays rugby with a local team, preferring to live a quiet life away from the spotlight.