It could have been a party.
Jones, a 36-year-old Texan in town for his friend Bret Watsons destination wedding, eventually left the room.
When he returned a few hours later, it seemed like his neighbors door wouldnt stop slamming.
Cover photograph by Leigh Keily/Contour RA by Getty Images
It sounded like people were coming and going nonstop, Jones says.
It was happening every few minutes.
At one point, someone even tried opening Jones door until he yelled at them.
But the ruckus continued.
[The shouting] just sounded manic, almost insane, he says.
I heard the loudest one around five, and then I started hearing all the sirens.
I hate to say it, Id never heard ofLiam Payne, Jones says.
But I looked him up, and I was like, Oh, wow.
This is not just anybody.
Payne was the handsome and charming pop sensation who melted Englands hearts onThe X Factoras a teen in 2010.
His 2017 solo track Strip That Down was certified triple platinum.
The singer had been staying at CasaSur since Oct. 13.
One friend told him Payne seemed desperate to be recognized.
I used to be in a boy band.
Thats why Im so fucked up.
He was aggressive and loud, a person who was in the lobby and requested anonymity says.
He had a frantic vibe….
It seemed like he was in a bad mental state.
Fuck this, he yelled.
He muttered incoherently and threw the computer on the floor.
The hotel staff got involved, Watson says.
A number of people were able to escort him out of the lobby.
(Hotel management did not respond to requests for comment.)
But Payne was back in the lobby 15 minutes later.
Watson remembers that he fell over a table, landed on the floor, and was shaking or convulsing.
He looked like he was in a semiconscious state, Watson says.
Leaked screenshots of security footage showed several men hoisting Paynes limp body to the elevator.
He was completely gone on drugs, says Salinas, who helped move Payne to his room.
We grabbed him because there was no way to take him standing up.
After the commotion, Watson returned to his room with his wedding planner, two floors below 310.
They left the balcony door ajar; it was a nice day out.
Around 5 p.m., Watson says, I saw an object fall out of the corner of my eye.
Our wedding planner saw it straight on, and it looked like she went into shock.
She goes, Oh, my God.
That was a body.
From the Apex of Stardom to the Lows of Addiction
Payne fell about 40 feet.
The singer, age 31, died at approximately 5:07 p.m. of polytrauma and hemorrhaging sparked by the fall.
A preliminary toxicology report indicated Payne had alcohol, cocaine, and a prescription antidepressant in his system.
A decade earlier, Payne was a beloved member of the worlds biggest boy band.
In the years after One Direction, he struggled to sustain fame as he grappled with addiction.
His only solo album, 2019sLP1,didnt live up to the promise of Strip That Down.
His ex-fiancee accused him of harassment and distributing nude photos of her as revenge porn.
Could anyone have prevented this tragedy?
Liams Voice Is Warm, Solid, Trustworthy
The goal was to assemble the ultimate boy band.
When they got to Paynes picture, Cowell remarked, He was the standout audition.
I think he would definitely shine, Scherzinger said.
I think that he could actually be the leader.
He thinks hes better than anyone else, Cowell observed with admiration.
LIAM WAS A SWEET BOY WHO NEVER HAD A CHANCE TO MATURE.
Payne, in many ways, did become One Directions leader.
Songwriter-producer Carl Falk, who worked on 1Ds first three albums, has called Payne the perfect song starter.
His voice was confident and suave with plenty of power but also a conversational ease.
Payne split the opening verse with Styles on their signature song, Story of My Life.
Baby, dont you know?
We can and then with everyone else live forever.
Its all these things that you need: Its familiar, safe, and itsthere.
Paynes talent and confidence were innate but practiced.
(The Payne family, through a representative, declined to comment for this article.)
Payne came into the world with just one functioning kidney.
He was in the hospital quite a lot.
Payne first auditioned forThe X Factorin 2008.
Paynes talent, ambition, and charisma got him through the first few rounds before he was sent home.
Determined to try out again, Payne spent the next two years focused on music.
Its a work-hard-from-the-bottom-up [mentality] in the Midlands.
A lot of our parents I know Liams parents were the same didnt come from money.
So youre taught to get out there and earn your crust.
He won over the crowd and judges with a vocal performance resonating with newfound conviction and dynamism.
The quintet jelled quickly to prove themselves to Cowell and the other judges.
Paynes work ethic was already well-ingrained, butThe X Factorpresented a new grind.
Waissel describes long days beginning at sunrise and ending after midnight.
Cowell assured fans that the end of the show was just the beginning for these boys.
By 2020, One Direction had sold more than 200 million records and amassed over 21 billion streams.
Bolstering it all was a legion of devoted fans.
For Payne, One Direction was the chance to become the artist hed always dreamed of being.
Shone remembers him as a workhorse.
The more fun we had, the more successful it got, Payne recalled in 2019.
NO ONE TEACHES YOU THAT WHEN YOU GO AFTER FAME, THIS IS WHAT IT COULD LOOK LIKE.
But the gig represents a very small percentage of the actual experience.
A lot of the time youre shuttled from stage to the hotel and back.
You couldnt get any mental breathing time…. Its that feeling of being caged up.
Payne took his first sip of alcohol in 2012.
By his own admission, the floodgates opened after that.
Within four years, he was recreationally using drugs, according to sources.
In interviews, Payne tied his addictions to his experiences on the road.
After the shows, he lived within the exhausting confines of planes, buses, and hotel rooms.
Whats in a room?
Payne opened up about how difficult it was being isolated and the craziness surrounding the group.
No one does that because nobody expects to be famous.
They do it for the love of art.
For Payne, it was a relief.
The day the band ended, I was like, Thank lord for that, he said in 2021.
I needed to stop, or it would kill me.
A Once-Promising Solo Career Falters
As One Direction ended, Paynes solo career and adult life began.
Two months after Bears birth, Payne released Strip That Down, featuring Migos rapper Quavo.
Strip That Down cracked the Top 10 in the U.S. and U.K.
It was an auspicious start.
But Payne also faced fresh challenges as he adjusted to this new phase.
In a 2019 podcast interview, he recalled: I had no personal life [in One Direction].
I remember getting to therapy one time.
When the guy was like, What do you like to do?
I just sat there in the chair going, like, What do I actually like to do?
Paynes next two singles did well but failed to reach the same heights as Strip That Down.
Instead of touring, he was doing one-off promotional gigs and TV shows.
Hes pretty fucked up.
HE HAD A FRANTIC VIBE.
IT SEEMED LIKE HE WAS IN A BAD MENTAL STATE.
Somers helped Payne get sober and accompanied him on the Jingle Ball tour in late 2017.
Youve got to move it on.
Their relationship became serious the following summer, and he proposed marriage in November 2019.
Achieving fame and wealth at such a young age contributed to his existing problems.
He pitched the song to Payne, who recorded it forLP1and eventually released it as a single.
Preston says he and Payne hung out, made music, and, he acknowledges, sometimes drank together.
He was such a talented musician, and he could allow himself to be so raw.
But whenLP1arrived in December 2019, it met tepid reviews and middling commercial success.
But thats an almost impossible task, Preston says.
Malik, Horan, and Styles each went to Number One with their debut albums.
Styles second album, the multiplatinum, Grammy-nominatedFine Line,dropped one week afterLP1.
Liam said he felt lost when 1D ended, the source close to Henry says.
WhenLP1was not received well, he became depressed and felt his fans did not support him anymore.
It petered out at Number 85 in the U.K. and failed to ripple the U.S. charts.
On top of his floundering solo career were Paynes drinking, drug use, and mental-health issues.
A source close to Henry says these were such a burden that Payne couldnt work properly.
Multiple sources suggest Payne also wrestled with his sexual identity, compounding his struggles and leading to risky behavior.
Liam struggled with his sexuality, a source close to the situation says.
During his relationship with Maya, he sexted men.
[Liam] wasnt recording; he wasnt touring, the source adds.
and hes just left with his problems.
And then Maya was just kind of held captive.
Shes like Ronnie Spector in Phil Spectors house: She cant do anything.
In 2020, Henry learned she was pregnant.
According to a source close to Henry, Payne gave her an ultimatum.
Ultimately, she agreed to terminate the pregnancy.
She was just tired, the source says.
Babysitting [Liam] was exhausting.
ON DRUGS, HE BECAME UNRECOGNIZABLE.
I KEPT HOPING EACH INCIDENT WOULD BE A WAKE-UP CALL.
By the time they broke up, Henry had learned the full extent of Paynes drug addictions.
Then he got into smoking heroin.
Initially, it was the drug use and addictions that tore us apart.
Anyone who has been with an addict understands how difficult that is.
On drugs, he became someone unrecognizable so different from his sober self.
I tried to be there for him.
I loved him so much that I convinced myself I could fix things.
I put myself in situations that were unsafe and harmful, ignoring every red flag, Henry continues.
I dont fault him for his struggles.
The source close to Henry says she never reported Payne to the police for his drug use or blowups.
When he got violent, the thought was never that he should be sent to jail.
Paynes private frustrations and addictions erupted into public view in May 2022 when he appeared on Logan PaulsImpaulsivepodcast.
After that, Payne remarked: How do you go from there?
I still dont know who I am … thats the worst part of it.
Payne had a good friend, Rogelio Roger Nores, who lived in Argentina, too.
Nores met withRolling Stonefor several interviews in Buenos Aires bustling coffee shops in December.
We would both offer a lot of emotional support, Nores says.
That was the core of our relationship.
I was going through a lot of stuff with my girlfriend and family.
But Nores maintains that he never held the position nor was he in charge of Paynes finances.
Nores has contested being Paynes manager in interviews withRolling Stoneand in legal filings.
Nevertheless, he was regularly by Paynes side during the last two weeks of the singers life.
I was his friend, Nores says.
I wasnt a doctor, I wasnt a psychiatrist, I wasnt his legal guardian.
I never had any control of that.
I wasnt his manager; I wasnt his father.
you’re free to only do so much.
Privately, he was still struggling.
Hed spent much of 2023 in and out of rehab.
His behavior was volatile, sources say seeking out drugs, sexting fans, and hiring sex workers.
That same year, Payne and Cassidy split briefly.
By 2024, Payne was in a fragile state.
His father unsuccessfully tried to commit him to a psychiatric treatment center, which Payne opposed.
Payne went through even more treatment programs without completing them.
In the midst of it all, Paynes label, Capitol Records U.K., dropped him.
What could have been a career comeback for Payne faltered when he failed to promote Teardrops.
Moreover, his label reps worried about Paynes well-being.
He was in no shape to go on the road.
The split from Capitol Records U.K. was legally formalized by September.
But there was one period last year when the chaos around Payne seemed to subside.
During his stay, sources say, Payne appeared to be sober.
Avendano recalls how Payne spent his days drawing and writing songs.
Avendano even suggested polo as a positive activity to help Paynes mental health.
He has photos of Payne on horseback with a polo helmet and stick.
But Payne was still consumed by his demons.
And I said, No, Liam.
No, no, no.
I have no idea.
(Nores also claims in court records that Payne was financially supporting Cassidy.
She could not be reached for comment.)
It was during this time that Geoff Payne said he started placing trust in Nores.
Nores, Geoff claimed, was a frequent conduit between father and son.
When Liam died, Geoff wrote, it was Nores who informed him.
Nores, for his part, has always maintained that he was only ever Paynes friend.
[Nores] did not have a legal duty to Liam.
Liam and [Nores] were dear friends and provided each other friend support.
She had been trying and failing for years to get Liam the help he needed.
He needed to face the root cause of why he used drugs in the first place.
(Nores declined to comment on this claim.)
He remembered peoples names and was chatty and approachable, Simon Hay, the shows shooting producer-director, says.
Another crew member recalls Payne as egalitarian and charming and said he really wanted to help the eliminated contestants.
That was the extra gut punch when I heard the terrible news, the source says.
He wouldnt be able to help them anymore.
There was a lot of funny boy-band jabs that we would take at each other.
He really had a quick wit to him that nice, dry, British humor.
Its been a while since me and Niall have spoken, he said.
No bad vibes or anything like that, but, just, um, we need to talk.
(Nores says, They met, and Liam was happy.)
The day after Horans concert, Payne went to the U.S. Embassy for his visa appointment.
Nores wrote that the doctor said nothing as far as I know about Payne requiring medical attention.
(Rolling Stonewas unable to reach the embassy to confirm Nores account.)
At the same time, allegations of Paynes disturbing behavior started becoming public.
On Oct. 6., in a TikTok, Henry claimed the singer had been harassing her and her family.
Paynes behavior was apparently even scarier than what Henry let on.
I said absolutely not.
Did I ever send u ones of Maya?
Or any of my exes.
It didnt end there.
HE IS IN A ROOM WITH A BALCONY, AND WERE A LITTLE AFRAID.
[Henrys] goal wasnt financial compensation she wasnt seeking money, the source close to Henry says.
A conflict between Henry and Payne had been brewing for months.
In May, Henry publishedLooking Forward,her roman a clef about her engagement to Payne.
It was written as a memoir, basically, the source close to Henry says.
But then she made little changes throughout for creative reasons.
Some of the dialogue is fake.
In another scene, Oliver shoves Mallory, breaks a light fixture, and chases her with an axe.
She calls his manager, who tells her to leave him, but she doesnt.
There are certain things that she still feels like shes processing, the source says.
The love I gave, the sacrifices I made they werent enough because they never could be.
I wasnt just heartbroken; I felt defrauded, as so many women in my position would.
But what I do know is this: It wasnt about me or anything I did.
It was about struggles beyond my control.
And in the end, I had to choose myself.
He mentioned it once, but he wasnt concerned at all, he insists.
Paynes patterns continued into his new relationship.
You just hope everything at the end will work out.
On Oct. 12, two weeks after Payne and Cassidy arrived together in Buenos Aires, she left.
They had a happy goodbye, Nores says.
He wanted to marry her.
Two days before he died, he asked me if I wanted to be his best man.
If I could see into the future, I would have never left Argentina, Cassidy toldTheSun.
We were just full of love, and I never would have expected [his death] to occur.
People started calling the neighborhood Hollywood.
There are small parks, boutiques, mom-and-pop shops, and plenty of cafes.
Whats your number, Payne asks.
They spent the night together, he said.
We consumed drugs because the truth is that something intimate happened.
Later, Paiz denied having sex with Payne.
The morning after his rendezvous with Paiz, Payne refused to see Nores.
Instead, he wanted to be alone, according to Nores statement.
Later, Nores went with Payne to take a visa photo.
When they saw each other that night, Nores wrote, Paynes room contained no traces of narcotic consumption.
I have all day.
Id gift you $5,000 US dollars.
You come to my hotel.
He then asked if her friend would join.
While he waited, Payne met Nores for a bite at Sacro, the restaurant connected to the hotel.
Payne ordered a whiskey.
In his statement, Nores says he protested, but Payne drank it anyway.
The singer had his laptop with him and said he was working on music.
Richards said that Payne seemed upbeat.
By 2 p.m., Payne had refused to pay the sex workers.
Still, he headed to the hotel.
Around this time, Nores saw the mess in Paynes room.
Nores expressed his displeasure with Payne for breaking the TV, he wrote in his statement.
Instead, Payne had the breakdown Watson, the groom staying a couple of floors below, witnessed.
CasaSur receptionist Grassi, who declined to comment for this article, called 911 twice around 5 oclock.
Help arrived too late.
On Dec. 27, they indicted five people.
All five have maintained their innocence.
Pereyras lawyer denies his client ever supplied Payne with drugs and calls him completely innocent.
It could be months before theres a final resolution.
Judge Bruniard ruled that Payne was trying to leave from the balcony of his hotel room when he fell.
She nevertheless suggested that those indicted bear some criminal culpability.
The judge, meanwhile, described Nores as Paynes guarantor.
The abandonment charge was eventually downgraded to negligence, and the drug charge was dropped.
Nores vociferously denies helping Payne acquire drugs.
Of course, I never gave him money for drugs, he says.
I never gave him drugs.
I dont drink alcohol, and Ive never interacted with a dealer in my life.
Thats how this all happened, Geoff stated.
You couldnt leave him in a vulnerable situation.
Paynes estate denied the allegation on Geoffs behalf.
Ultimately, Nores suggests, Payne was responsible for himself.
He was a fucking free person, Nores says.
He did whatever the fuck he wanted.
Nobody would stop him.
Upstairs, the mood is more subdued.
In front of room 310, a security guard sits in a chair.
Right outside the hotel is a memorial to Payne that a few dedicated fans have tended to daily.
Covering the trunk and the surrounding planter are photos, signs, and handwritten notes.
How can I forget someone who gave me so much to remember?
reads one, quoting Paynes song, Remember.
Your memory will stay alive until my heart stops beating, goes another.
Its important to fight against this injustice, Karla Reyes, 20, says.
He deserved a longer, more successful life.
He deserved to see his son grow up.
She adds: I think this can actually make a difference.
I hope they see us.
If theres more [rallies], I will be here supporting.
It was the best day of my life, she says, smiling.
His music helped me when I needed him most.
She carries his laminated autograph wherever she goes.
I asked him to promise me that wed both be OK, Reyes remembers.
