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Judge Laura Bruniard – who is handling Liam Payne‘s death investigation – has declared that the singer jumped off his hotel balcony in an attempt to escape the building while in a drugged state.
The former One Direction star died on October 16, after he fell from a third-floor balcony at the CasaSur Palermo Hotel. The Argentinian prosecutor’s office later shared that the cause of death was due to multiple traumas and internal and external bleeding.
Now, in a ruling obtained today (December 30) by Rolling Stone, Bruniard shared new information on the death of the ‘Strip That Down’ singer’s tragic death and updated charges against the five people charged in connection with his passing.
Those charged in connection to his death are Payne’s friend Roger Nores, CasaSur Palermo hotel manager Gilda Martin, reception head Esteban Grassi, Ezequiel Pereyra and Braian Paiz.
Wrongful death charges were made against Nores, Martin and Grassi, with the judge noting: “I do not believe that [Nores, Martin, and Grassi] planned and wanted Payne’s death. They did not plan the result but created a legally disapproved risk.”
The charges were levelled against them due to their “imprudence and negligence”, resulting in Payne’s death. The ruling sees Nores’ charges being lowered after originally facing five to 15 years in prison for “abandonment followed by death.”
The judge had written that Nores’ had taken on the “position of guarantor” to Payne’s family and was the main contact for the singer at the hotel. Based on Payne’s autopsy report, Bruniard went on to note that “Payne’s state of vulnerability was evident” when Nores decided to leave the hotel 50 minutes prior to the musician’s deadly fall.
In her ruling, the judge declared that while in a severely vulnerable and intoxicated state, Payne was “trying to leave his room through the balcony” prior to the fall. “Payne’s consciousness was altered and a balcony was in the room. The proper thing to do was to leave him in a safe place, and with company, until a doctor arrived,” she wrote, adding that the hotel employees who had taken him back to his room “did not act maliciously” but were “imprudent” in their actions.
She continued: “I maintain that [Payne] tried to leave from the balcony of the place where he was left because the forensic experts noted that he did not lose his balance. This is how the fall occurred.”
In regard to Nores’ role in the death, Bruniard wrote that “he should have consulted with a doctor given the commitment made to the family of the deceased. He should have done this without trusting how the hotel employees could have dealt [with Payne].”
The charges come just days after Nores filed a 91-page document to support his defence to the charge of abandonment followed by death.
In the document, Nores maintained that he was not Payne’s doctor, lawyer, or representative, and claimed that when he left Payne at the hotel the day he died, he was “greeting fans” and seemed to be fine.
“I was a friend who loved him very much, who helped him selflessly in everything I could, who spent my own money to help him, and even then it was not enough,” Nores wrote. “I do not consider that I deserve the accusation that is being levelled at me.”
As for Pereyra and Paiz, who are both accused of selling Payne drugs, they will have to face preventative jail time. Back in November, Paiz broke his silence, admitting that he met the late One Direction singer twice before his death and confessed to taking drugs with him. However, he insisted that he never supplied Payne with narcotics nor accepted any money from him.
Paiz’s attorney, Fernando Madeo Facente shared a statement with Rolling Stone which slammed the accusation, calling the judge’s ruling “completely arbitrary and illegitimate.”
