TMZ has come under fire for posting — and then deleting — photos from the scene of Liam Payne’s death Wednesday. While many have expressed outrage and surprise at the outlet’s decision to publish the photos in the first place, others have expressed the opposite. As @jmtanon wrote on X, “TMZ has always been like this, from Avicii to Liam Payne—sacrificing ethics just to break the news first.”
Payne died after he fell three stories from his hotel room in Buenos Aires. It is unclear if the fall was accidental or intentional. A spokesperson for the Security Ministry of Buenos Aires municipality told the AP the singer had “thrown himself from the balcony of his room” and police were called to the hotel due to an “aggressive man who could be under the influence of drugs or alcohol.”
TMZ was among the first outlets to report Payne’s death. The outlet initially published photos that showed the singer’s identifying tattoos on his body, a decision that sparked outcry on social media. Author Ira Madison tweeted, “TMZ you’re sick” within minutes, and singer Alessia Cara echoed Madison’s post on X an hour later with her own in which she wrote, “you’re gross @TMZ.”
“It’s the idea of the discussion that had to have gone down at @TMZ re: what to do with the photos of Liam Payne which disgusts me the most,” Vanity Fair writer Chris Murphy wrote on X. “That just doesn’t happen someone makes the call to post those photos which is the least human thing you can do in this moment RIP.”
TMZ has caught fire for its handling of celebrity deaths before. In January 2020 Vanessa Bryant learned of the deaths of her husband Kobe and daughter Gianna through the website, something she admitted in her testimony against Los Angeles County. Bryant was first told by an assistant that five people had survived the crash; she soon learned the opposite was true.
“I was holding onto my phone, because obviously I was trying to call my husband back,” she testified, “and all these notifications started popping up on my phone, saying ‘RIP Kobe. RIP Kobe. RIP Kobe.”
At the time retired LAPD officer Tim Murakami tweeted, “I am saddened that I was gathering facts as a media outlet reported the Kobe had passed. I understand getting the scoop but please allow us time to make personal notifications to their loved ones. It’s very cold to hear of the loss via media Breaks my heart.”
In the same year TMZ was criticized for reporting the death of Pop Smoke before his family was notified; NewsOne also criticized how the outlet has reported the deaths of Black celebrities in years prior. In 2019 TMZ shared surveillance video that showed Nipsey Hussle being shot several times, and in 2018 the outlet published footage of XXXTentacion’s body in his car after he was killed.
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