Prosecutors say they took several dozen testimonies, analysed more than 800 hours of security footage, extracted the contents of Payne’s phone, including messages on messaging apps and social networks, and examined hotel guest and bar records. Police also carried out a series of raids at the hotel and several other properties. The investigation is ongoing, authorities are still hoping to unlock Payne’s broken laptop.

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Shortly before Payne died, a hotel manager called 911 seeking help for an intoxicated guest. “When he’s conscious, he’s breaking everything in the room. We need someone to be sent, please,” the manager said. Images of Payne’s hotel room show a smashed television and drug paraphernalia.

An autopsy concluded Payne’s death was “caused by multiple trauma” and “internal and external hemorrhage”, the result of his fall from the third-floor room of the hotel in the Palermo neighbourhood where he was staying, the statement said.

Three additional medical-legal reports had been commissioned, the statement said, and they found: “All the injuries … were compatible with those caused by a fall from a height and that self-harm of any kind and/or physical intervention by third parties were ruled out.

“They also highlighted that the victim did not adopt a reflex posture to protect himself from the fall, so, for the moment, it can be inferred that he may have fallen in a state of semi or total unconsciousness.”

On the news of his death, former bandmates, including Harry Styles, said they were devastated.

“Liam lived wide open, with his heart on his sleeve,” Styles wrote, “he had an energy for life that was infectious.”

With Reuters and Nell Geraets

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