Zach Hickerson found Hayden Panettiere unresponsive in an Airbnb in South Carolina on Aug. 16 and tried to keep her alive with CPR. The newly released 911 audio puts his panicked response at the center of the death investigation. It also shows how quickly a call turned into an emergency with no recovery.
Aug. 16 in South Carolina
Hickerson had just returned from church when he found her and called authorities. He told the dispatcher, “Oh god, oh my god,” then said Panettiere was not breathing. When asked if she was breathing, he answered, “No, I don’t think so.”
The dispatcher told him, “OK, we need to start CPR” and later added, “I’m going to tell you how to do CPR, OK? We’re gonna start with ventilation first.” Hickerson was also told to find a defibrillator, but he could not locate one. He then performed CPR until first responders arrived and took over.
Hayden Panettiere’s death report
Panettiere was 36 when she was pronounced dead at the scene at 2:32 p.m. local time. The death investigation later found no signs of trauma that would have contributed to the death, and her manner of death was ruled an accident. The toxic effects of 4-ANPP, fentanyl, methocarbamol, alprazolam and quetiapine were listed in the findings.
Brian Hickerson was in an on-again, off-again relationship with Panettiere, yet it was his brother who was the one trying CPR while emergency responders were on the way. Brian Hickerson also gave officers a bag of medication she had been taking, tying the emergency call to the broader medication findings that followed.
2015 to 2018 backdrop
Panettiere had spoken publicly in 2015 about postpartum depression on Live with Kelly and Michael, calling it “something that’s completely uncontrollable” and “really painful and really scary.” She and Wladimir Klitschko ended their engagement in 2018, and she gave full custody of Kaya to him. Those details do not change the emergency audio, but they explain why her final hours now draw attention beyond the call itself.
The new release matters because it supplies the clearest spoken record of the final minutes before first responders took over. The unanswered issue is the period between the moment Hickerson found her unresponsive and the arrival of help, which is where the timeline of the last response still rests.
