Eerie vision shows final moments of Sydney teen Tyler Mason’s life

EXCLUSIVE

It’s early in the evening of March 14 when Sydney teenager Tyler Mason films a video of himself smiling in the elevator of a luxury hotel.

Shortly after, another clip is shared to social media showing the boy, who’d just turned 15, singing and dancing along to an Eminem song inside a suite on the 35th floor.

Within a few hours, Tyler would be dead after plunging from the room’s balcony, in what police are treating as a suicide.

But his devastated family can’t fathom that conclusion and have raised questions about the circumstances leading up to the tragedy, which they say “don’t make sense”.

A news.com.au investigation drawing together extensive details from multiple sources, comprising audio recordings, vision, text and instant messages, has pieced together a bizarre timeline of events.

Happy, singing and dancing

It appears Tyler was in great spirits that night, eager to celebrate a close friend’s 16th birthday in style. He donned a red tracksuit with a black T-shirt underneath and made his way to a five-star hotel on George Street in Parramatta.

“You know where I’m at? Meriton Suites, my boy!” he beams in one video posted to social media.

It had been a difficult few weeks for the boy.

In late February, Tyler’s mother died in a single vehicle car accident while in north Queensland with a male acquaintance.

His aunt Jo-Ellen Hall, a mental health nurse, was checking in with him regularly and told news.com.au: “His mum’s death obviously hit him hard, but he was more angry than anything.

“I sat him down and we spoke for a long time about how he was going. I asked him – I said, ‘you’re not going to do anything silly?’ and he was clear, he said, ‘no, only weak people commit suicide’ and that he wasn’t thinking like that.

“I didn’t think he was a suicide risk. He was angry, yes. He wasn’t depressed though. He had gone back to school. He was talking about wanting to be a carpenter, about wanting to make his mum proud.”

Do you know more? Email shannon.molloy@news.com.au

At the height of the party, celebrating a female friend’s 16th birthday, Tyler and five others crowded into a room. All but one were minors who were required to sign in at reception, with an 18-year-old man who’d booked the room left in charge of the group.

In another social media video obtained by news.com.au, filmed in the room’s lounge area, Tyler and a girl sing and dance while Eminem’s hit 2002 single Without Me blares from a speaker.

‘Frothing at the mouth’

It’s understood that the party attendees agree Tyler consumed two Vodka Cruisers and one Hennessy cognac and Coke.

“The police told me he had a low blood-alcohol reading and the kids in the room also said he only had a few drinks,” Ms Hall, who is Tyler’s formally declared next of kin, said.

It’s believed he was in the room for about five hours when, just before 10pm, a call was made by one of the girls to an adult family friend to say Tyler was extremely unwell.

“He couldn’t move,” a teenager who was in the room has said. “If you showed up there, he wouldn’t know who you was. That’s how f***ed up his mind was.”

Another said Tyler was “freaking out really badly”.

When the male family friend arrived at the Meriton Suites, no-one would come down to reception to sign him in, so after waiting for a period of time, he left and returned home.

Meanwhile, it’s understood Tyler was still extremely unwell upstairs. He had vomited, lost control of his bladder, and was “frothing at the mouth”.

Each time Tyler tried to stand, he would collapse to his feet. He was unable to speak, it has been claimed.

It’s understood he was carried into the bathroom at some point, stripped off, and placed in a warm shower. He was shivering uncontrollably.

His soiled red tracksuit was “washed”, it has been claimed.

A discussion was had about calling an ambulance, but a teenager present was subject to a night-time curfew as a condition of bail.

Next half hour ‘doesn’t make sense’

By 11pm, Tyler was helped to a couch to lie down. He was naked and a towel was placed over him.

One of the youths in the room claims there had been several loud arguments throughout the night and alleges a knife was produced during one of them.

It’s understood the door to the bathroom had been kicked in. It has also been alleged there was a physically violent altercation between two of the youths.

At 11.28pm, Tyler fell from the hotel room balcony. Emergency services would later find his body on a podium level of the building several storeys above the street level.

At 11.34pm, another call was made to the adult family friend by a distraught girl and he rushed back to the hotel.

The five teenagers rushed downstairs and could be heard screaming while in the elevator. It’s understood the first triple-0 call was made just before midnight by one of the girls.

Another of the youths “got out of there straight away” and was gone by the time police and paramedics arrived, it’s understood.

In vision obtained by news.com.au, a girl can be seen sitting outside the Meriton Suites at 12.22am in a state of distress, screaming repeatedly “he’s gone, he’s gone” while police stand nearby.

In the clip, she appears to be in a state of undress on a chair, wrapped in a towel and sitting on Tyler’s red tracksuit.

A second video, shot at 12.30am, shows one of the teenagers speaking to police while another screams and sobs.

Paramedics sedated a girl and she was taken to hospital, it’s understood.

Officers were told Tyler had run through the hotel room, out onto the balcony and climbed over the rail. Words to the effect of “he killed himself” were said to police.

“His friends told [Tyler’s family] that he was sick, unable to walk … basically non-responsive, even foaming at the mouth. How does someone go from so intoxicated they are unconscious to being able to climb over a balcony railing and jump in an hour? It doesn’t make sense.”

Family’s unanswered questions

News.com.au has been told none of the youths have been formally interviewed by police in the three months since.

Ms Hall was notified on March 15 by police that Tyler had taken his own life.

“I couldn’t believe it,” Ms Hall said.

“A few weeks after the funeral, a lot of rumours began going around about what happened that night. There are so many inconsistencies with the versions of event, with the timeline and what happened when.

“I believe he was overdosing on something. No-one called an ambulance. I just don’t believe he killed himself.”

News.com.au could not verify Ms Hall’s assertion that Tyler was under the influence of drugs, although it’s understood a toxicology report has been prepared.

“I don’t know why they weren’t checked on by someone from the hotel earlier in the night,” Ms Hall told news.com.au. “The amount of noise being made … the screaming.”

It’s understood that at no point during the evening did Meriton staff or security visit the room despite the commotion that had carried on for hours and late into the night on a Thursday.

Nor did anyone at the hotel enforce a curfew policy that required underage, unaccompanied guests and those not registered on a booking to leave by 11pm.

Meriton declined to respond to a detailed list of questions about Tyler’s death.

Ms Hall has started a GoFundMe so she can engage a lawyer to act on the family’s behalf and represent their interests, in a desperate search for clarity.

In a statement, a Meriton spokesperson said: “The matter is being handled by NSW Police. We have provided assistance to their inquiries, and as such, we are unable to disclose further information.”

NSW Police refused to respond to detailed questions about the case. In an initial email to news.com.au, a spokesperson said: “As this is mostly likely a self-harm incident, we are unable to provide further information.”

NSW Ambulance also declined to comment.

A report is being prepared for the coroner and will be submitted by the end of June. The coroner will then determine if an inquest should be held.

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