Little more than 90 minutes after Liam Payne fell to his death at a Buenos Aires hotel, the Internet was ablaze.
Not only were fans bereft as the news filtered out, but there was consternation at the decision by gossip website TMZ to publish cropped images of his lifeless body.
The photos – which clearly showed his distinctive tattoos – were taken down within hours because of the outrage.
But the damage was done as copies of the images continued to spread like wildfire to every corner of the Internet, from Facebook to Google and X.
Now on the second anniversary of his death, the Mirror can reveal the exhaustive lengths to which the family fought to remove not only those pics but other similar images of Liam’s last moments from circulation.
It has emerged that they were able to quietly enlist the Argentinian courts to take on the social media giants on whose platforms the snaps existed.
Facebook and Google were both hit by a court order in June 2025 banning the dissemination of any images. Argentina’s communications regulator, ENACOM, who are broadly comparable to Ofcom in the UK, were also contacted. This also included any potential leak of images from the subsequent police investigation.
A source said: “At the heart of the move was the desire to protect Liam’s son Bear from being confronted with such images when he was older. It was very much a sweeping clamp-down, which was very much welcomed. If you look online now, you are unable to see them, which is a huge relief.”
In an intriguing twist, the legal fight echoed the one waged by Diego Maradona’s daughters after disturbing photographs of the football legend’s body spread across the internet four years earlier.
On that occasion funeral home employees sparked outrage after posing next to the Argentinian star’s open casket.
His children Dalma, Gianinna and Jana applied to the court who similarly formally notified Facebook, Google and ENACOM to take action.
A source said: “Like Bear, the court similarly took the view that the deceased’s children needed to be protected from mental torment. There was clearly a striking precedent when it then came to Liam’s case.”
Liam’s former partner Cheryl, 43, has fiercely guarded Bear’s privacy since his birth.
She is formally involved in the Argentine proceedings on his behalf, and has devoted much of her life to raising their son away from the spotlight.
Liam himself spoke about Cheryl’s devotion to their son in 2022, saying: “She is the best mum in the world. I couldn’t ask for someone better. He is all she cares about and I couldn’t ask for more.”
The couple, who separated in 2018, remained close as they raised Bear, with Liam living just minutes away from Cheryl. He described their friendship as having grown stronger since their split and spoke about the joy of taking his son to school.
However everything changed when Liam died aged 31 on October 16, 2024, after falling from a third-floor balcony at the CasaSur Palermo hotel.
Cheryl issued an emotional statement two days later, appealing for an end to the publication of distressing details about his final moments for the sake of their son.
She said: “Liam was not only a pop star and celebrity, he was a son, a brother, an uncle, a dear friend and a father to our 7-year-old son.
“A son that now has to face the reality of never seeing his father again. What is troubling my spirit the most is that one day Bear will have access to the abhorrent reports and media exploitation we have seen in the past two days. It is breaking my heart further that I cannot protect him from that in his future.”
Liam’s family also told last year how the “constant media attention and speculation…has exacted indescribable, lasting damage on the family, particularly on Liam’s son who is trying to process emotions which no seven-year-old should have to experience.”
The statement was issued in the wake of authorities dropping manslaughter charges against one of Payne’s friends, Rogelio “Roger” Nores, and two members of staff at the hotel where he died.
Two other men still face charges of supplying drugs to Payne on the night he died. The trial date has yet to be fixed.
The singer had travelled to Buenos Aires, where he attended a concert by former One Direction bandmate Niall Horan. His girlfriend Kate Cassidy subsequently returned to the United States, leaving Liam in the Argentine capital, where he died alone.
Toxicology tests identified cocaine, alcohol and traces of a prescription antidepressant in his system. A post-mortem examination concluded that Liam died from multiple traumatic injuries and internal and external bleeding.
Meanwhile, the British inquest into Liam’s death remains unfinished. At a hearing in May, Buckinghamshire senior coroner Crispin Butler said he had received no further evidence from Argentina through the Foreign Office since the previous review.
Another hearing is scheduled for December 1, more than two years after the singer’s death. A source said: “There is no doubt that the family would very much like closure.”
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: mirror.co.uk
