One Direction star Liam Payne’s friend Roger Nores has given a bombshell interview detailing the singer’s final hours.
Liam died aged 31 after he fell to his death from a third-floor balcony at the CasaSur Palermo Hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in October. Businessman Nores, who is from Argentina, formed a friendship with Liam in 2020 after they met at a Vogue event in London.
They had spent time together on the day of the singer’s death. Nores is understood to be one of five people who are under investigation by the authorities following his tragic passing. Argentinian officials are said to suspect him of abandoning the star.
Nores has since taken part in a TMZ documentary “TMZ Investigates: Liam Payne: Who’s to Blame?” where he made a series of claims about the singer, the Mirror reports.
He told the TV producers Liam was ‘in good spirits’ on the day he died and was ‘perfectly balanced’. The claim follows on from wide reports suggesting Liam had been in a frenzied state hours before he fell to his death – and one hotel employee called emergency services before the tragedy.
In the documentary, Nores said this is an incorrect depiction of the singer. “I’m a very good friend of Liam, and I was with him the day that he passed away. He was in good spirits. He was like talking to 10 or 15 Americans that were here for a wedding. And so he was talking to them, and he was joking around.”
He also claimed there was “nothing out of the ordinary” when it came to Liam’s behaviour on that day after visiting him three times. He said: “”I left like at 4:05, or so, and he was in good spirits.
“He was perfectly balanced, talking to everybody, having fun, laughing, so nothing out of the ordinary. So that’s when I said, ‘bye’. He seemed playful and happy. I went to the hotel three times to check on him. He seemed tipsy but nothing out of the ordinary and that’s when I said, ‘Okay, bye’.”
TMZ’s Harvey Levin then asked: “So you left him about an hour before he fell off that balcony. And you say, he seemed fine?” To which Nores stated: “Yeah, well, he seemed playful and happy.”
The businessman went on to slam claims he abandoned the singer. He said: “I went to a hotel three times to check on him. During that morning, he seemed tipsy, but nothing out of the ordinary.” The public prosecutor’s office in Argentina said one of the people charged had been accompanying Liam and was accused of “abandonment of a person followed by death” – which carries a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison.
A toxicology report found traces of alcohol, cocaine and prescription antidepressants in Liam’s system.
Officials also ruled out suicide, explaining that “in the state he was in, he did not know what he was doing and could not understand it”. Liam suffered catastrophic injuries incompatible with life from the fall. According to the official report, Liam “did not adopt a reflexive posture to protect himself in the fall, so that, for the moment, it can be inferred that he may have fallen in a state of semi- or total unconsciousness.”
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