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Friends of Hayden Panettiere have reportedly been left dealing with grief and regret following the actress's sudden death at the age of 36.
Those close to the Heroes and Nashville star are said to have had serious concerns about her long-running, on-and-off relationship with Brian Hickerson, with one Hollywood source claiming to the Daily Mail that they “hated him”.
People who knew Panettiere personally and professionally reportedly feared the relationship was harmful, but felt unable to persuade her to permanently walk away.
“He was bad news from the beginning,” one Hollywood agent claimed. “Her friends hated him. They thought he was trouble. They thought she was better than this relationship. We kept waiting for her to see what everyone else could see.”
Hickerson, 37, was reportedly among the people present with Panettiere when police responded to an emergency call at a luxury apartment complex in Greenville, South Carolina, on Sunday afternoon.
There is currently no indication that Hickerson caused or contributed to Panettiere’s death, with the investigation still ongoing.
A heavily redacted police report allegedly states that Hickerson and his brother Zach were at the property when emergency responders arrived.
According to the report, Zach was “very emotional” as paramedics attempted to revive Panettiere, while Brian allegedly showed little visible emotion until she was pronounced dead.
The report also states that Hickerson showed officers a “bag of medication” belonging to Panettiere.
The circumstances have reportedly been particularly difficult for her friends to process given Hickerson's presence during her final moments.
“We will replay conversations,” one producer claimed. “We will remember phone calls and moments when we spoke up or stayed quiet. Could another intervention, another conversation have changed the ending? We will never know.”
Panettiere's relationship with Hickerson had previously been surrounded by allegations of domestic violence.
In 2021, Hickerson pleaded no contest to two felony charges involving injuries to a girlfriend. He was subsequently sentenced to 45 days in county jail, required to complete 52 domestic violence classes and given a five-year restraining order.
Hickerson later acknowledged one occasion when he became physically violent towards Panettiere.
Panettiere also detailed her allegations of abuse in her 2026 memoir, This Is Me: A Reckoning, describing how the alleged violence escalated over time.
“The slaps become hits,” she wrote. “One night he busts up my face so badly I don’t leave the house for weeks.”
A music industry source claimed those around Panettiere struggled to understand why she repeatedly returned to the relationship.
“Everyone around her thought she deserved better,” the source said. “Nobody understood why she kept going back to him. We could see the pattern and we were terrified she couldn't see it herself.”
Panettiere's mother, Lesley Vogel, also spoke publicly about Hickerson following her daughter's death.
“This person in her life that we have been trying to get rid of for quite some time was with her at her death and that was Brian Hickerson,” she told NBC News.
Reports have also claimed Panettiere traveled with Hickerson from Los Angeles to South Carolina shortly before her death.
Sources previously told TMZ that the pair had been “dating consistently for years”, despite keeping their relationship largely private while Panettiere promoted her memoir.
“Hayden's camp felt Brian was ‘bad for business’,” TMZ reported.
However, one family source claimed that "Hayden loved bad boys." “She didn't want to be abused. She didn't wanted chaos. She was drawn to toxic relationships.”
Another source offered a blunt assessment: “She thought love was supposed to hurt. She confused intensity with intimacy.”
A television executive who previously worked with Panettiere said those around her believed she required stability rather than the turmoil allegedly associated with Hickerson.
“She needed stability and he represented the opposite,” the source said. “He was the one person everybody wished she would cut out completely. Yet he kept coming back. And so did she.”
That reportedly left Panettiere's friends facing a difficult decision whenever Hickerson returned to her life.
“Hayden's friends tried to remain close to her rather than completely sever contact when Hickerson returned,” a celebrity makeup artist claimed. “They knew that attacking him too aggressively could push Hayden further away. You wanted to save her, but you couldn't make the decision for her.”
Panettiere's death remains under investigation, and her official cause of death has not yet been established.
For those closest to her, however, the circumstances surrounding her final hours have reportedly left an agonizing question hanging over them: whether there was anything more they could have done.
