Police officers were spotted arriving at the South Carolina home belonging to Brian and Zach Hickerson's grandmother on Wednesday morning, just days after Hayden Panettiere was found dead at a nearby Airbnb.
Two Greenville Police Department patrol cars arrived at the property, belonging to a Betty Ellison and located just five miles from the Judson Mill Lofts apartment complex where Panettiere died, at around 8.20am. Officers knocked on the front door and attempted the side door before leaving around three minutes later with no response. Blinds at the property were closed throughout. Zach Hickerson had been spotted at the home the previous day.
A GPD representative confirmed officers were responding to a welfare check request but did not specify who it concerned.
New details have also emerged about the night Panettiere died. According to reports, Brian Hickerson was asleep in the bedroom when his brother Zach walked in and discovered Panettiere unresponsive. Zach described her to police as his "brother's girlfriend," amid reports the pair had quietly rekindled their relationship in the months before her death despite a history of domestic violence, arrests and criminal pleas.
A device used to dispense Narcan, a medication used to reverse opioid overdoses, was found on a mattress at the scene. It remains unclear whether Panettiere received a dose or whether it had been used by someone else. The official cause of death remains pending toxicology results, though 911 dispatch audio referenced a suspected overdose.
Three days before Panettiere's death, Hickerson had a request to reduce his past felony domestic violence charges to a misdemeanour denied by a judge. He had pleaded no contest in 2021 to two felony counts of injuring a spouse or girlfriend stemming from multiple incidents involving Panettiere between 2019 and 2020, receiving 45 days in county jail, four years of formal probation, 52 mandatory domestic violence classes and a five-year restraining order.
No arrests have been made and police have indicated no signs of foul play.
