LOS ANGELES — XBIZ spoke with adult performer AJ Applegate this morning about the death of her long-time partner, fellow performer Bill Bailey, at a hotel in the Iztacalco neighborhood Mexico City Sunday night.
Bailey had traveled with Applegate to the Mexican capital, where she was one of the headliners at Expo Sexo 2019, billed as "Latin America's largest sex convention."
"We were leaving the convention and some of us went out for dinner but I had a driver take [Bill] back to the hotel, because he was intoxicated," Applegate told XBIZ. "I told the driver, ‘Please, take him back to the hotel and make sure he’s safe.’ He got there but instead of going to bed he saw Tori Black, Lexi Belle, Mia Malkova and her boyfriend and he wanted to keep partying, but they saw he was drunk and told him to stay, and then he fell."
Applegate, who is trying to set the record straight after egregious, unsourced misreporting by the Mexican and international press, gave XBIZ her account of the incident and the aftermath:
"Mia’s boyfriend ran to see if he was okay but he realized that he had passed from the impact."
"We were out for dinner when [Applegate's friend] Randy [Quintana] got a phone call from the hotel. It was a bunch of us—Kendra Lust, Nina Elle, and the owner of the Expo—people were trying to translate for me. I went back to the hotel but they wouldn’t let me in."
"There was no altercation or anything like that. It was a tragic accident."
"The owner of the Expo was helping me, they were all very nice to me, they wanted to get the process expedited so we could get him back to his family."
"[Bill's] family in Tennessee is taking care of everything right now and they should have him within a day."
"I’m back here [in California] now. I was going to go to Tennessee yesterday but I missed the connection so I’m waiting to get booked on another flight. I’m trying to get there for the funeral. They’re arranging it now."
For the last two days, some Mexican press accounts have been misreporting non-factual information and uncredited rumors, which have found their way into the international press. These unfounded rumors, which are not based on any official statements or credited interviews, are particularly upsetting to Applegate.
Male culture blog LAD Bible, which appears as one of the top searches on Bailey's death, is propagating rumors from Mexican media that Bailey "may have been involved in an argument with another unidentified person at some point," something that Applegate strenuously denies.
Meanwhile, U.K. tabloid The Mirror is incorrectly reporting that Bailey "served in Iraq before working in the porn industry."
"I don’t know why people are saying he was an Iraq War veteran," says Applegate. "He never went to war or anything like that."
Finally, Applegate has a message for friends, colleagues and fans trying to reach out in this difficult moment: "Please let everyone know who has texted me and messaged me on Twitter that I really appreciate it."
Applegate is particularly touched by the universal outpouring of love for Bill Bailey from everyone who knew him and worked with him in the adult industry: “That’s the way I wanted to remember him and I appreciate it so much.”
Photo: AJ Applegate and Bill Bailey celebrating a family Christmas in Tennessee. Courtesy of AJ Applegate
