The horrific moment Liam Payne plunged from his third-floor Buenos Aires hotel balcony was captured on CCTV, an Argentinian broadcast journalist has claimed.
The former One Direction singer fell to his death this month while staying at the CasaSur Hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The star had been holidaying in the country and even attended old pal Niall Horan’s concert with his girlfriend Kate Cassidy at the beginning of the month.
And now, broadcast journalist Paula Varela has claimed the footage showed the Strip That Down singer had fallen after he “fainted” on the balcony but revealed authorities were keeping it secret. The 45-year-old mum-of-two also claimed on a popular Argentinian TV show that a night worker at the CasaSur Palermo Hotel who had struck up a close relationship with Liam was the focus of an ongoing investigation which was trying to establish who supplied him with the drugs suspected of contributing to his death on October 16.
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Paula said on Socios del Espectaculo, a show broadcast on Buenos Aires-based TV station Canal 13: “There is footage that is not being released to the media with the balcony scene where you see that Liam faints and tragically because of where he is, falls from that balcony. If he had been beside his bed he would have fallen on his bed.
“It’s not that he jumped deliberately. This footage is in the official case files. There’s a lad who’s being investigated, he was working nights at the hotel. He struck up an excellent relationship with Liam. He disobeyed an order from the hotel management. What was the order he disobeyed? It was not to take anything into Liam’s room.”
She continued: “Because of the good relationship he had with Liam he requested a car through one of these taxi apps we all use because Liam wanted something. He did him that favor, a massive error because he’s being investigated, and they’re seeing what was transferred in that vehicle. It’s one of the things the investigators are looking at at the moment and obviously this hotel worker has been suspended. He’s a cherished member of staff, a good worker, but he disobeyed an order that could have proved fatal.”
Prosecutors said in a statement after Liam’s death they believed he was in “in a state of semi or total unconsciousness” during a substance-induced ‘psychotic episode’ when he fell.
Head of the state emergency medical system, Alberto Crescenti, confirmed that the singer fell into an internal courtyard. Speaking to Argentina’s Todo Noticias TV channel, Crescenti said: “A few minutes later [an] emergency team arrived and confirmed the death of this man who we later learned was from a musical group. He had injuries incompatible with life as a result of his fall. There was no way to do anything.”
In the toxicology report, it was stated that the position in which his body was found, along with the injuries from the fall, ‘it is presumed that Payne did not adopt a reflexive posture to protect himself and may have fallen in a state of semi or total unconsciousness.’.
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