Five people have been charged in relation to Liam’s death (Image: WireImage)

The individuals involved in the death of Liam Payne will today fight their charges as they launch a fresh appeal to clear their name of any wrongdoing

The five men who have been charged over Liam Payne’s death will learn their fate today.

Lawyers for Liam’s friend Rogelio Nores and the two hotel workers accused alongside him of manslaughter will attempt to overturn judge Laura Bruniard’s decision to indict them and pave the way for a bombshell trial later this year.

And the attorneys for the two suspects charged with selling the singer cocaine before his drink and drug-fuelled October 16 fall, and facing up to 15 years in prison if convicted, are due to contest their pre-trial incarceration which took effect following their arrests last month. The hearing at Argentina’s National Criminal and Correctional Court in Buenos Aires was due to take place yesterday before being put back a day following the January judicial recess in the South American country.

Appeal judges are not expected to make immediate rulings but legal sources said they hoped their decisions would be announced before the end of the week. Mr Nores’ hotshot new lawyer is Rafael Cuneo Libarona, the brother of Argentina’s Justice Minister Mariano Cuneo Libarona.

Roger Nores has been accused of manslaughter ( 
Image:
Bloomberg via Getty Images)

He is working alongside the Buenos Aires legal firm the US-born businessman hired last year to reinforce the argument Rogelio was never Liam’s manager or the “guarantor” judge Bruniard described him as when she decided to charge him.

Mr Cuneo Libarona, who is also playing a key role in a separate DOLLARS 10 million defamation lawsuit his client has lodged in Palm Beach, Florida against Liam’s dad Geoff, told an Argentinian news website last month: “My client is not a manager, he is not a nurse, he is not a psychologist, nor a psychiatrist, nor is he dedicated to the recovery of addicts. He is a simple friend in Argentina who helps him in his business affairs.”

The other two men appealing their manslaughter indictments are Esteban Grassi, the chief receptionist at CasaSur Palermo Hotel in Buenos Aires who made a 911 call moments before Liam died, and its head of security Gilda Martin.

Grassi was one of the three men identified alongside Martin in the last harrowing photo of the former One Direction singer to emerge showing him being carried back up to his room from his hotel lobby shortly before his balcony plunge. Like Mr Nores they are facing between one and five years in prison if convicted as charged although they have been told they could be eligible for suspended jail sentences.

Waiter Braian Nahuel Paiz will also discover his fate ( 
Image:
Gerard Couzens)

The other two suspects, 24-year-old waiter Braian Nahuel Paiz and 21-year-old suspended hotel worker Ezequiel David Pereyra, are appealing judge Bruniard’s decision to remand them in prison pending her continuing criminal probe. They have both been charged with selling Liam cocaine and warned they could face prison sentences of between four and 15 years if convicted.

Mr Nores’ alleged managerial role towards Liam, a position he has denied holding, has been key to the decision to prosecute the businessman. Judge Bruniard in an indictment ruling at the end of December accused Mr Nores, currently banned from leaving Argentina because of the charges against him, of “failing in his duty of care, assistance and help” towards the singer.

She alleged he “abandoned him to his fate, knowing he couldn’t fend for himself, aware he suffered multiple additions to alcohol and cocaine and fully conscious of the state of intoxication, vulnerably and defenceless he was in.” It subsequently emerged the businessman had been described as Liam’s manager in an internal hotel email after he visited CasaSur Palermo Hotel and was shown a first-floor room he “liked a lot” before the singer ended up checking into the third-floor suite he plunged from after binging on drink and drugs.

The word “Manager” was written along the name Roger Nores towards the end of an October 11 email and the words assistant manager against the name below Roger’s – that of Lulu Miranda who has been referred to in prior reports about the Liam Payne investigation as a pop star and a friend of Mr Nores.

Liam had been staying at the Casa Sur Hotel at the time of his death

She was born in Los Angeles to an Argentinian diplomat father and a Brazilian mother who has lived in Buenos Aires since she was a teenager. She is not among the five people charged and there is no suggestion at this stage she will be accused of any wrongdoing, or that she was actually acting as Liam’s assistant manager in any formal or informal capacity.

Argentinian prosecutors referred to Liam’s friend Roger Nores in a lengthy statement they released on December 30 as the “victim’s representative” although they identified him only by his initials R.L.N. Mr Nores told a TMZ documentary aired in December examining the life and death of Liam Payne that he was “in good spirits and perfectly balanced” the day he died as he refuted claims the singer was acting erratically and was intoxicated shortly before his fatal fall.

The businessman had previously protested his innocence and refuted claims he was Liam’s ‘de facto’ manager which is seen as a key aspect to the prosecution decision. He said in a statement shortly after it emerged he was being officially investigated before being charged: “I never abandoned Liam, I went to his hotel three times that day and left 40 minutes before this happened.

“There were over 15 people at the hotel lobby chatting and joking with him when I left. I could have never imagined something like this would happen. I’ve given my statement to the prosecutor on October 17 as a witness and I haven’t spoken to any police officer or prosecutor ever since. I wasn’t Liam’s manager. He was just my very dear friend.”

Mr Nores has also insisted in a written statement he presented to the courts that he “wasn’t Liam’s doctor, lawyer, representative or therapeutic companion” and their relationship was based solely around friendship. In deciding to indict hotel chiefs Mr Grassi and Mr Martin, Laura Bruniard pointed the finger at them over their decision to move Liam from the lobby to his third-floor room when he couldn’t stand on his feet because of his prior drink and drug binge. She said it “created a legally unacceptable risk to his life” which had “foreseeable” consequences.

Ezequiel Pereyra handed himself in on January 6 after making himself a fugitive the previous week following failed police attempts to locate and arrest him so he could be remanded in pre-trial custody on the orders of the investigating judge. Paiz, who has denied any wrongdoing and insists he took drugs with Liam but never sold him cocaine, was arrested on January 3 so he could be remanded in prison.

The other three suspects have been allowed to remain free men but were told to surrender assets to stay out of prison. In his separate US defamation lawsuit against Geoff Payne, Rogelio Nores has accused the singer’s dad of making “misleading false and defamatory claims” in sworn statements to prosecutors in Buenos Aires investigating Liam’s death which have incriminated him, including the assertion he was Liam’s nurse and was responsible for his care.