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Home / Music and sport / Liam Payne fell from a Buenos Aires hotel balcony with no will, and his £24 million went to…
Case file s559 · Music and sport · 2024
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2024
Liam Payne: One Direction NRJ 2013 2
Liam Payne. Georges Biard. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons.
Died
16 October 2024
Place
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Field
music (One Direction) · Music on the timeline
Legal tradition
English intestacy law; Argentine criminal law · Common law · Civil law
Historical event
the death of a One Direction member and prosecutions in Argentina
Music and sportDied without a willNowLatin AmericaArgentina

Liam Payne fell from a Buenos Aires hotel balcony with no will, and his £24 million went to his seven-year-old son

Liam Payne fell from a third-floor balcony at the CasaSur Hotel in Palermo, Buenos Aires. The hotel had called emergency services about "an aggressive man who could be under the effects of drugs and alcohol." Toxicology found alcohol, cocaine and a prescribed antidepressant. On 30 December 2024 an Argentine judge charged five people: a waiter and a hotel employee with supplying drugs, and a businessman friend and two hotel managers with manslaughter. On 20 February 2025 the manslaughter charges against those three were dropped. A UK inquest opened on 8 January 2025 and has been adjourned twice; a pre-inquest review is set for December 2026. Payne left no will and was not married. Under English intestacy rules his whole estate passes to his son, Bear, his son with Cheryl, and an unmarried partner receives nothing. The Probate Registry's first grant, in May 2025, put the net estate at £24.3 million; a later figure was £21.9 million. Cheryl and music lawyer Richard Bray are the administrators. The estate is held in trust for Bear until he is 18.

What the law took from it

With no will, the law picks the heir, and an unmarried partner is not on its list.

Sources
  1. tribune.com.pkPress
  2. thenightly.com.auPress
  3. ibtimes.co.ukPress
  4. The New York TimesPress

Cite as: celebrity.estate, “Liam Payne fell from a Buenos Aires hotel balcony with no will, and his £24 million went to his seven-year-old son,” story s559, https://www.celebrity.estate/liam-payne-2024, updated 30 October 2026.

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Where this case sits

Music and sportDied without a willNowLatin AmericaCommon lawCivil lawArgentina