5 people charged in Liam Payne death, friend and hotel workers accused of negligent homicide

One Direction singer Liam Payne, incapacitated by “consumption of various substances,” couldn’t maintain his balance in a hotel lobby before needlessly falling to his death, Argentinian prosecutors said Monday.

Five people, a friend of Payne’s and four hotel employees, face criminal charges in connection to Payne’s fatal fall at the Casa Sur Palermo Hotel in Buenos Aires on Oct. 16, officials said.

A judge approved charges against Payne’s companion, the hotel’s manager and the hotel’s head of reception. All three were accused of “negligent homicide,” according to prosecutors.

Those defendants showed “imprudence, negligence, lack of skill in their art or profession or failure to observe the regulations or duties in their charge (that caused) the death of another,” the prosecution said.

Two other hotel employees were also charged for allegedly furnishing drugs to the late singer.The hotel manager — identified by the initials GAM — was in the lobby and “noticed the state of health” of Payne, “who was unable to stand due to the consumption of various substances,” according to the prosecution statement.

That hotel manager “allowed, at least by omission, for Payne to be taken to his room moments before his death” and that Room 310 had a “balcony that, given the detailed situation, was a source of risk.”

The reception manager, identified by the initials ERG, also witnessed Payne’s vulnerable state and should have kept “him safe in an area without sources of danger, in company and until he could be provided with medical care,” the prosecution said.The singer had a personal representative traveling with him, a companion called RLN, who prosecutors said is “criminally responsible” for Payne’s death by failing “to comply with his duties of care, assistance and aid that he had.”

A waiter, identified only as BNP, and another hotel worker, called EDP, were both accused of supplying “cocaine in exchange for money” to the victim.