Liam Payne's drug dealer suspect breaks silence on his involvement with the late One Direction star

BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA: Liam Payne's accused drug dealer, Argentinian waiter Braian Nahuel Paiz, made his first public appearance as he broke his silence and shared an unseen photo with the singer amid his death investigation.

Following the former One Direction bandmate's unfortunate death on October 16 following a fall from the third story of his hotel suite in Argentina, three people have been placed under custody.

During his TV appearance in Argentina on Saturday, November 9, Paiz, who has been identified as the singer's "dealer," admitted to having two hotel encounters with the 31-year-old before his deadly fall, as reported by The Irish Sun.

Liam Payne's 'drug dealer' opens up for the first time, provides unseen photo

Braian Nahuel Paiz, one of the three people being investigated in relation to singer Liam Payne's death, has stated publicly that he is innocent.

Paiz confirmed consuming drugs with Payne and admitted to visiting him twice at his hotel before the terrible event on October 16 but he strongly denied giving the celebrity any illicit drugs or stealing from him.

The 24-year-old Argentinian waiter further claimed that during a second encounter, he spent time with the 'Strip That Down' singer at the CasaSur Palermo Hotel in Buenos Aires.

While proclaiming his innocence on local television, Paiz shared an unseen picture of Payne taken only days before the tragedy occurred. It featured the singer flashing the peace sign while wearing a cream New York Yankees cap and sweatshirt, per The Mirror.

The two first met at Paiz's workplace, a restaurant in the exclusive Puerto Madero neighborhood. The waiter said that he and Payne exchanged contact details while the singer dined with his girlfriend Kate Cassidy and two other people.

In the opening of the unprecedented interview, Paiz admitted that his old residence had been searched but asserted that police had not yet questioned him, per the Express.

"We swapped details and saw each other later that night. It was all normal. He came down from his hotel room to fetch me because I had got lost," he said.

During his TV appearance, the waiter further claimed that the two took drugs together but stressed, "I never took drugs to him or accepted any money."

Paiz told journalist Guillermo Panizza he last met the celebrity on October 13 and that he still has the communications that set up their meeting.

Liam Payne used 'secret' Instagram to communicate with Braian Nahuel Paiz

In a different segment of the interview, Argentinian waiter Braian Nahuel Paiz further stated that he was unaware of the identities of the other two suspects being investigated by the authorities.

According to a tense Paiz, the singer communicated with him via a "secret" Instagram. "I gave him an Instagram and afterwards he sent me messages because he wanted to take drugs although he had already consumed narcotics," Paiz said.

After the TV program showed viewers a picture of him and Payne together, allegedly taken during their first hotel encounter, Paiz went on: "Our second hotel meeting was on the night of Sunday, October 13."

"We spent the night together, we consumed drugs...He wasn’t aggressive at all, he behaved really well with me, he was really sweet. He asked me if I was okay," he added.

Paiz claimed in a digression of what happened that night that Payne "appeared frightened" when he left and, rather than inserting his room card into the key slot, shoved a few papers into it to "keep the door open."

"I didn’t really understand what was going on but at the same time I realized something strange was happening," he admitted.

In a final segment of the interview, Paiz said, "I have messages where he’s offering me money because he was apparently used to offering money for everything but I never accepted anything."

"When I left he wanted to give me some clothes so that I had a memory of being with him but I left it behind the TV because I didn’t want to take it."

Paiz added that he was perplexed when pictures of drug paraphernalia in Payne's room were released after his death: "When I saw the photos of the inside of Liam’s hotel room nothing made any sense to me. The Dove soap packet was there when I was in the hotel, but I couldn’t understand what it was for."

The second individual connected to Payne to come forward is the restaurant employee, who reportedly lost his job due to his involvement in the current criminal investigation.