Hayden Panettiere's on-and-off boyfriend was at apartment where she died, police report says

Actress Hayden Panettiere, 36, best known for 'Heroes' and 'Nashville,' was found unresponsive and in cardiac arrest at a Greenville, South Carolina Airbnb on August 16 and pronounced dead after resuscitation efforts failed; a preliminary autopsy found no signs of trauma, and police said there were no indications of foul play, though the investigation -- which the DEA later joined -- remained open pending toxicology results. Her on-and-off boyfriend, Brian Hickerson, and his brother Zach were present at the time; Zach told TMZ he found the couple asleep on a pullout couch after knocking, discovered Panettiere unconscious, called 911, and that Brian administered Narcan before both performed CPR until paramedics arrived. Hickerson, who had two prior felony domestic-violence convictions against Panettiere from a 2019-2020 relationship period and had unsuccessfully sought to have those charges reduced just three days before her death, gave authorities a bag of medication she had reportedly been taking.

Panettiere's mother and former manager, Lesley Vogel, from whom the actress had been estranged since giving her an ultimatum roughly a year earlier to leave Hickerson, publicly blamed him for her daughter's death, telling NBC News 'this person in her life that we have been trying to get rid of for quite some time was with her at her death.' Panettiere's ex-fiance and father of her 11-year-old daughter Kaya, Ukrainian boxer Wladimir Klitschko, posted an emotional tribute describing the family's 'profound shock and grief.' Panettiere, who had spoken publicly about postpartum depression, substance-abuse struggles and giving Klitschko custody of Kaya in 2018, had detailed those experiences in her 2026 memoir 'This Is Me: A Reckoning'; her final film co-star, Justin Chatwin, said he sensed she was 'struggling' and lonely on set earlier in 2025. Her younger brother, Jansen Panettiere, died unexpectedly in 2023 at age 28.