Presley Gerber may have suffered an overdose and gone into cardiac arrest when he died at a rehab facility on Sunday (Sept 20), according to audio of the call summoning first responders.
A call came in to the Santa Monica Police Department for a cardiac arrest at 9.35am, according to dispatch audio obtained by People, with reference to an overdose in a subsequent dispatch.
The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner’s Office had finished an autopsy Monday afternoon, noting there was “no indication of foul play” and that the official cause of death was deferred. The investigation is ongoing, the office told People.
Details of the 27-year-old model’s death were still scant, with the ME’s office continuing to maintain that “the investigation is still ongoing and there is limited information available” in a statement emailed to the Daily News, which added, “Death was pronounced at 09.45 hours on September 20, 2026, by responding paramedics. The Santa Monica Police Department is the investigating law enforcement agency.”
Gerber had been open about his mental health and substance abuse struggles, especially since a DUI arrest in 2019 when he was 19. In March he revealed in one of his last Instagram posts that he had resorted to psychedelic drug treatment in a last-ditch healing effort.
In the video, which he posted from Mexico, Gerber said he was about to take ibogaine, a psychoactive compound derived from the root bark of the Tabernanthe iboga, a shrub that grows naturally in Central and West Africa, according to the UC Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics.
While it has shown promise in the treatment of opioid addiction, post-traumatic stress disorder and brain injury, it can also trigger potentially fatal heart problems.
Gerber leaves behind his mother, model Cindy Crawford; his father, businessman Rande Gerber, and his younger sister, actress and model Kaia Gerber. – New York Daily News/Tribune News Service
