Liam Payne’s heartbroken girlfriend has revealed One Direction fans sent her death threats and crude comments about what she wore to the pop singer’s funeral.
Kate Cassidy, 25, said she was forced to delete her social media due to the barrage of abuse she received in the wake of the 31-year-old’s death in October last year.
Online bullies called the US influencer a ‘gold digger’ amongst other nasty insults, but Kate said she was able to shrug off the verbal attacks thanks to her experience in the showbiz world with Liam.
She told The Sun: ‘Liam would want me to be as strong as I can be, and just have a thick skin. That’s one thing he always taught me. He grew up in this life, and he always was just so positive about it and said, ‘Don’t let any hate get to you’.’
The One Direction star died after falling from a balcony on the third-floor of his hotel room in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where he had been on holiday to see his former bandmate Niall Horan perform.
Kate had been with the singer on the trip but returned to their Florida home early to look after their rescue dog, Nala.
The American admitted she had seen first-hand the harmful side of super-fandon, after speaking out for the first time on Wednesday to dismiss cruel accusations that she abandoned Liam in Argentina before his death.
Kate said: ‘I understand that some of the more negative comments come from a place of loving Liam, and concern, and caring for Liam.
‘So I understand that because I love Liam too. But for sure it’s hard because obviously any criticism will get to you.’
Kate, who met Liam for the first time in 2022, posted a tribute to the singer online a week after his death, describing him as ‘my best friend, the love of my life.’
She previously shared a note written by Liam before he died suggesting the couple would marry within a year and admitted she would have never left Argentina early if she knew the singer’s death would happen.
She said she knew the pair were soulmates from the very first time they met, which was when she was a waitress in South Carolina, but that she had loved him since she was 10-years-old, believing that they were always meant to meet.
Liam delayed his flight home, and the pair spent two days together in a hotel, beginning what she describes as a ‘fairytale romance’.
The devastated girlfriend called the singer the most humble and charming people she had ever met and insisted she was not to blame for the death of her partner.
Kate later left her college plans behind and became a full-time influencer, a career Liam fully supported.
Now with more than 2.5million followers, she has since moved back to New Jersey after leaving the multi-million rented mansion they shared in Florida.
A report from the States claims she has been given ‘living allowance’ and expenses totalling around £20,000-a-month since Liam’s death.