Liam Payne was reportedly under the influence of a powerful drug that can cause hallucinations when he fell to his death from the balcony of a hotel room in Argentina on Wednesday night, according to police.
The former One Direction star was using a dangerous substance called “crystal”, which “makes users experience extreme highs and extreme lows, often making them aggressive,” according to Buenos Aires police. TMZ reported on Friday,
Drugs may have been behind a 31-year-old former boy bander’s “erratic” behavior before his death.
Authorities told the outlet it may have also caused hallucinations, which played a role in his fatal fall from the third-floor balcony of his room at the Casasur Palermo hotel.
Photos taken from inside Payne’s hotel suite after his death show a chaotic sceneThe room was littered with trash, champagne bottles, a broken television and piles of drug paraphernalia including powder and tinfoil.
The images also show a packet of Dove soap, an empty glass, the remains of a burnt candle and the burnt top of a drinks can on a desk – as well as traces of a white powder which authorities confirm Will test to see if it could be cocaine. La Nación, Argentina’s largest newspaper, reported, confirming the shocking images.
Investigators also found wax and burnt foil in the suite’s bathtub.
Sources told the outlet that Payne’s body was found on the ground floor along with “a bottle of whiskey, a lighter and a cellphone.”
Medics said Payne’s injuries were “incompatible with life” – according to La Nación, first responders described a “cranial fracture” that led to “instant death”.
Payne had been to rehab twice before – when he was a member of One Direction and after the group’s split – and had commented on how the addiction made him suicidal.
“I was worried about how far my rock bottom was going. Where is rock bottom for me? And you may have never seen it. I’m very good at hiding it. No one would have ever seen it coming,” Payne said during a 2021 appearance on “The Diary of a CEO” podcast.
He was reportedly telling people that he was sober in the months before his death A source with direct knowledge tells TMZ,
He rose to fame in 2010 when he auditioned for “The X Factor” when he was 16 years old. He then joined the popular boy band One Direction, which broke up in 2015.
Payne leaves behind her 7-year-old son, Bear. whom he shared with ex Cheryl Cole,
