[All photos via Patrick McMullan]
Casey Johnson, heiress to the Johnson & Johnson fortune, was no doubt a large figure in the NYC Socialite scene. She was a smart girl, accepted into Brown University, whose trajectory seemed limitless. Socailly, she ran with a fast crowd which included childhood friends Paris and Nikki Hilton. Her recent death, however, closed the final chapter in the story of an heiress who got tangled up in a web of drugs and chemical imbalance as many of her social peers became pop culture phenoms. Above, photos of Casey with friends... Natasha Bedingfield, Bijou Phillips, Nicole Richie, Amy Sacco, Rachel Hunter, Damon Dash, Noah Tepperberg, Lizzie Grubman (her former employer), Dina Lohan, Dori Cooperman, Lauren Bush, Countess LuAnn De Lesseps, Cristina Cuomo, Anne Dexter-Jones, Shoshanna Gruss, and more.
Raised from fabulous wealth on Fifth Avenue, Casey was a precocious Eloise, receiving her first Chanel purse at the age of ten. She was a Gossip Girl's Serena van der Woodsen, graduating from a tony Manhattan private school and enrolling at Brown — only to drop out freshman year to intern for queen bee publicist Lizzie Grubman. She was Paris Hilton's foil before Nicole Richie was. [Gawker]
Paris Hilton is just one of the socialite's friends that has expressed her condolences over Twitter
In bed crying, looking at baby pictures of Casey, Nicky and I. I feel so upset. I feel like I've lost a sister. My heart is broken. Miss her from web
Casey's own Twitter account was last updated on the 29th and often included tweets regarding her girlfriend turned fiance, Tila Tequila. Tequila, who clearly spotted an opportunity in a vulnerable Johnson, preyed on her weaknesses and has continued to exploit the publicity of her death by furiously tweeting up a storm.
Man about town, Peter Davis, wrote a story on the death of Casey on the Daily Beast today. The story of the heiress, found in her rented house on Mulholland Drive which was reportedly in shambles, can be found HERE.