New details about Hayden Panettiere’s final hours are emerging after Zach Hickerson, the brother of her on-and-off boyfriend Brian Hickerson, publicly described what he says happened inside the South Carolina Airbnb where the actress was found unresponsive.
Panettiere di*d on August 16, 2026, at age 36 in Greenville, South Carolina. While authorities continue investigating her sudden passing, Zach says he decided to speak because of the growing speculation surrounding Brian and the circumstances inside the residence.
According to Zach, the three had plans to spend time together that Sunday. He said he had been communicating with Hayden and Brian about meeting for lunch, but when he couldn’t reach them as expected, he eventually went to the Airbnb himself.
When Zach arrived, he says the situation immediately seemed unusual.
He reportedly discovered Hayden unconscious while Brian was asleep elsewhere inside the residence. Zach said he woke his brother and alerted him that something was seriously wrong.
The brothers then called for emergency assistance and attempted to help Panettiere until first responders arrived. Zach says they tried emergency lifesaving measures while following instructions from dispatchers. Despite those efforts and those of emergency personnel, Panettiere could not be revived.
She was pronounced de@d shortly after 2:30 p.m.
Parts of Zach’s account line up with the official police report. A responding Greenville officer reported encountering Brian and Zach at the residence and seeing emergency personnel performing CPR on an unresponsive woman. The officer wrote that there did not appear to be an obvious physical explanation for why she was unresponsive.
That report has become important because numerous theories have circulated online about what happened before authorities arrived.
Zach is now pushing back against some of those assumptions.
He said Hayden had been his friend for approximately eight years and described himself as heartbroken by her passing. He also urged people to stop drawing conclusions while authorities are still trying to determine what happened.
Brian’s behavior at the scene has also attracted attention. According to the police report, he provided officers with a bag containing medications that Hayden had reportedly been taking. However, authorities have not said those medications caused her de@th, and the existence of medication at the residence does not establish a cause.
Brian has faced particularly intense scrutiny because of his complicated history with Panettiere.
Their relationship began in 2018 and included previous domestic-violence cases involving Hickerson. Panettiere later discussed the abusive relationship publicly and wrote about parts of her experience in her memoir.
But that history should be kept separate from what investigators have established about her de@th.
Police have not accused Brian Hickerson of causing Panettiere’s de@th, and officials have reported finding no signs of foul play. An autopsy also found no evidence of trauma contributing to her passing.
Most importantly, the official cause of de@th remains undetermined.
That means Zach’s account provides a clearer picture of what he says happened inside the Airbnb, but it does not answer the central medical question surrounding the case.
For now, investigators have a timeline showing Zach arriving at the residence, Hayden being discovered unresponsive, Brian being awakened, emergency assistance being summoned and attempts being made to revive her.
What caused the 36-year-old actress to become unresponsive remains the unanswered part of the story.
And that is the point Zach appears most determined to emphasize: he wants the investigation—not online speculation—to establish what really happened during Hayden Panettiere’s final hours.
