Former One Direction member Liam Payne was found dead at his hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina on the night of Wednesday, Oct. 16.
Payne was in Argentina for 2 weeks before his death, he was there to support his former band member, Niall Horan at his concert on Wednesday, Oct. 2.
This naturally came as a shock to fans around the globe.
“I was so shocked at first,” says Janelle Hernandez, junior at MCHS. “I didn’t think it was real, … so I googled it and all I could see was reports on his death.”
His cause of death was found to be internal and external bleeding, as well as multiple traumas after falling from his hotel’s third story balcony. Payne was unconscious when he fell.
People investigating the case interviewed witnesses, two women and two hotel workers, and created a timeline of Payne’s last few hours alive. Apparently the witnesses had been in his room earlier on Wednesday, but left before his death.
Drugs and narcotics were found in his room, and toxicology reports showed traces of alcohol and narcotics that he had consumed.
Payne was found with “pink cocaine” in his system, which is a recreational drug that is typically a mix of methamphetamine, ketamine, MDMA, cocaine, benzodiazepine and crack.
“The toxicology reports shocked me because I did know that he struggled with the issue in the past,” says Marissa Calabrese, junior at MCHS who’s a fan of One Direction. “He apparently had tried to get help in the lobby but they just sent him right back up to his room.”
After the call for help, a hotel worker had called authorities saying that a guest was intoxicated on both alcohol and drugs, he was also causing a disruption, making the worker fear for Payne’s life since his room had a balcony.
Reportedly, two women were with Payne in his final hours, and they claimed that only alcohol was consumed when they were with him. When the two attempted to leave, they ran into some conflict.
There was a lot of chaos after that including shouting and glass breaking according to workers. This is allegedly the reason for the mess in Payne’s hotel room.
There have been a lot of reactions to his death, including TMZ publicly sharing photos of Payne’s body, which was universally seen as a violation of privacy and as wildly disrespectful.
“The photos being posted is so disgusting,” says Calabrese. “I saw them on Twitter and I don’t think I could ever look at Liam the same. It’s just so heartbreaking.”
“I think they went way too far with that,” says Hernandez. “There are just some things that the media doesn’t need to publish and that is one of them.”