(Buenos Aires) Argentine prosecutors revealed Thursday that former One Direction member Liam Payne had consumed alcohol, cocaine and antidepressants before his death on October 16, and that three people have been charged with in particular having supplied him with narcotics.
Posted at 4:28 p.m.
Updated at 5:25 p.m.
“The results of the toxicological studies – already communicated to his family – revealed that, in the moments preceding his death and for at least his last 72 hours, Payne presented in his body a polyconsumption of alcohol, cocaine and antidepressants” , indicates the prosecution in a press release.
Liam Payne died at the age of 31 from “multiple trauma” and “internal and external bleeding” after falling from the balcony of his hotel room in Buenos Aires where he had been staying for a few days.
His father Goeff Payne returned his body to England on Wednesday.
The prosecution also confirmed the first results of the autopsy suggesting that the injuries on the victim’s body were compatible with those of a fall and that self-mutilation or “physical intervention by third parties” were excluded.
The autopsy revealed that on Payne’s hands “no ‘defensive’ injuries were found, that all injuries were vital and produced simultaneously with each other.”
In other words, due to these injuries and the position of the body on the ground, the autopsy estimated that “Payne did not adopt a reflex posture to protect himself [dans la chute] and that he may have fallen into a state of semi-or total unconsciousness.”
A thesis validated Thursday by the prosecution: “Payne was not fully conscious or was going through a state of notable reduction or abolition of consciousness at the time of the fall”.
Three indictments
The investigation opened into the causes of death, with the examination of cell phones, computers and videos from security cameras, searches in the hotel room and “numerous witness statements in order to reconstruct the last hours of the victim and the course of events”, led to the indictment of three people for sale of narcotics and abandonment of a vulnerable person, announced the prosecution.
Without specifying the names of the people involved, the prosecution specified that the person who accompanied Liam Payne daily during his stay in Buenos Aires was charged with “abandonment of a person followed by death”, an offense punishable by 5 to 15 years in prison, and supply of narcotics.
A hotel employee “faces charges of twice supplying cocaine to Liam Payne during his stay,” and a third person is “charged with twice supplying narcotics at two different times on October 14.” .
In a 2023 video posted on his YouTube account, Liam Payne admitted to having been admitted to a rehab center for his alcoholism: “I kind of became someone I didn’t really recognize anymore. And I’m sure you don’t recognize it either,” he said then.
The singer’s death sparked a wave of tributes across the world.
One Direction, who was one of the boys band the most lucrative in the world, with its smooth and light pop, had released its fifth and final studio album, Made in the A. M., en 2016. The announcement the same year of a break in the group’s career, never formalized as a separation, had upset millions of admirers.
The members of the group then began solo careers with varying degrees of success. Liam Payne released his first album, LP1in 2019. Last year he announced that he was working on a second album and had just released a new single in March 2024. He was the father of a child now aged 7.
