Presley Gerber Died in a Home California Does Not License

Presley Gerber was pronounced dead at 9:45 a.m. on September 20, 2026, in a Santa Monica recovery home California does not license as treatment. He was 27. Santa Monica police are investigating a suspected overdose, and the medical examiner has deferred the cause of death.

A law enforcement source said the model arrived at Resolutions Living about 10 p.m. on September 19. People close to him said he appeared under the influence and should have been sent to detox. The house that took him in sits in a category the state left unlicensed on purpose.

He Checked In Saturday Night and Died Before 10 a.m.

Gerber, the son of Cindy Crawford and Rande Gerber and the older brother of Kaia Gerber, signed with IMG at 15 and walked for houses including Moschino, Calvin Klein, and Dolce & Gabbana. He had talked in public about depression, substance use, and asking for help. A representative for the family said, “The family is asking for privacy during this very difficult and painful time.”

On September 21, the Santa Monica Police Department said officers at about 9:35 a.m. the day before answered a report of a possible overdose in the 1000 block of Berkeley Street. They found an adult male already dead. The Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner identified him as Presley Gerber, 27, and said detectives are treating the death as a suspected overdose, with no indication of foul play.

Dispatch traffic listed cardiac arrest and an overdose at the same address. The medical examiner said paramedics pronounced dead at 09:45 hours on September 20. That is 10 minutes after officers were logged as arriving, and 11 hours 45 minutes after the 10 p.m. check-in. The case number is 2026-14977.

THE HOURS AFTER CHECK-IN

1. September 19, 2026, about 10 p.m.: A law enforcement source says Gerber arrives at Resolutions Living in Santa Monica.
2. September 20, 2026, 9:35 a.m.: Santa Monica officers respond to a possible overdose on the 1000 block of Berkeley Street and find an adult male dead.
3. September 20, 2026, 9:45 a.m.: Paramedics pronounce him dead. The medical examiner later lists the place of death as a rehabilitation facility.
4. September 21, 2026: A deputy medical examiner performs an examination. Cause and manner of death are deferred pending more testing, which the office says can take a few months.

The house is a three-story, seven-bedroom mansion valued at $7.7 million. Resolutions Living markets chef-prepared meals, an in-home movie theatre, and staff on site around the clock. Medical examiner records used the word rehab. The California Department of Health Care Services used a different word.

One Founder, Two Santa Monica Businesses

Reza Nabavi, a licensed clinical psychologist, is founder and owner of Resolutions Living and founder and executive clinical director of Resolutions Therapeutic Services. The names travel together. The licenses do not.

Resolutions Therapeutic Services operates from 2001 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 505, and bills itself as a partial hospitalization, intensive outpatient, and outpatient clinic for mental health, trauma, addiction, and co-occurring disorders. The Joint Commission lists Reza Nabavi, PhD, A Psychology Corporation under behavioral health, with accredited outpatient, PHP, and IOP programs. The clinic’s own substance-use pages describe daytime PHP work, then a return each evening to “a safe home or sober living environment.”

Resolutions Living is the house. Its about page calls the place a co-ed recovery residence in northern Santa Monica and a perfect complement to a day of therapeutic work at an intensive outpatient program of the resident’s choosing. The same page also sells a “three-phase recovery program,” life-skills and vocational coaching, and staff who work with families. The admissions line is (310) 905-3002. The clinic line is (310) 893-3255.

RESIDENTIAL TREATMENT VERSUS RECOVERY HOUSING

That split is the business model, and it is also the gap. A family can pay for a mansion with staff in the hallway and still be inside a dwelling the state does not treat as a treatment facility. A close friend wrote that Gerber “was so excited to get into this new rehab and really turn things around.” The word he used was rehab. The state’s word is housing.

California Leaves Recovery Residences off the License List

DHCS holds the only state license for adult alcohol or other drug recovery or treatment facilities that offer residential nonmedical services. A home crosses that line when it provides even one listed service. A home that stays on the housing side of the line is a recovery residence, sometimes called a sober living home or sober living environment.

The department’s complaint page is blunt. It does not license, certify, or investigate complaints against sober living or transitional living homes. Those places may still owe city permits and local fees. They do not owe Sacramento a treatment license unless they start providing treatment.

Based on publicly available information, the program appears to operate as a sober living environment or recovery residence, which is not licensed by DHCS and therefore not subject to state licensure requirements.

Department of Health Care Services representative

The California Department of Public Health also said it does not license or regulate Resolutions Therapeutic Services or Resolutions Living. If someone alleges that an unlicensed house is still running recovery, treatment, or detoxification services, DHCS is required to look. If nobody makes that allegation, the department is not required to open a recovery-residence file.

SERVICES THAT FORCE A DHCS LICENSE

• Detoxification: Withdrawal management on site is a licensable service, not a house rule.
• Individual sessions: One-on-one counseling of the kind listed in Title 9 counts as treatment.
• Group sessions: Structured groups for recovery or treatment, not a house meeting about chores, trigger licensure.
• Educational sessions: Formal recovery education is on the same list.
• Treatment planning: A written alcoholism or drug-abuse recovery or treatment plan is enough, by itself, to require a license.

Resolutions Living’s public copy walks up to that line and leans on it. It promises structure, accountability, individual recovery plans, and a three-phase program. It also tells residents they will do their clinical work at an outpatient program they choose. Whether any of the listed services were delivered inside the Berkeley Street house is a facts question for investigators, not a slogan on a website.

What Happens When Someone Arrives Intoxicated

Sober living is built for people who are already abstinent and need a dry house, peer pressure, and time. It is not a substitute for medical detox. Intoxication is an acute problem. Withdrawal can be lethal. A recovery residence that takes a resident who is still high is doing a job the model was not written to do.

People in Gerber’s orbit said the house should have turned him away and sent him to a detox center. Sources with direct knowledge described him as visibly under the influence when he arrived. It is not public whether anyone at Resolutions Living ran a medical or psychological check before giving him a bedroom.

A former FAQ on the home’s site, later taken down, said people without enough clean time for its outpatient programs were referred elsewhere to be “medically supervised for their detoxification phase under 24-hour nursing care.” That sentence is the facility’s own standard, in its own words. If Gerber still looked intoxicated at 10 p.m., that FAQ was describing a different door than the one he walked through.

Richard Taite, founder and chairman of Carrara Treatment, which is not tied to Resolutions Living, said a case like this shows that professional care “doesn’t make somebody medically invincible.” Luxury bedding and a night staffer in the hall do not replace a monitored withdrawal bed. The state’s recovery-residence rules do not require the house to keep one.

A Stayed Revocation and a 2028 License

Nabavi’s psychologist credential is current. Board records list an expiration of June 30, 2028. The path to that license is the part that sat in state files for two decades and surfaced again after Gerber died.

In February 2002, two years before he finished a Ph.D. in clinical psychology at the California School of Professional Psychology, Oakland officers found him asleep in a car in an area they described as known for narcotic and prostitution activity. He was 25. A 15-year-old girl in the car told officers she did not know him well and was under the influence of methamphetamine. Officers said a search of the vehicle turned up meth, marijuana, a hunting knife, a handgun, and ammunition.

In May 2002 he pleaded no contest to misdemeanor possession of a controlled substance and received 36 months of probation. Later that month he was arrested again after agreeing to sell meth to an informant; officers said they found meth, a glass meth pipe, and marijuana. In June 2002 he again pleaded no contest to misdemeanor possession and again received 36 months of probation.

The California Board of Psychology denied his psychologist registration in September 2004 for conviction of a crime, a crime substantially related to the practice of psychology, use of a controlled substance, and unprofessional conduct. Another denial followed in May 2005. He registered as a psychological assistant in January 2006. In February 2006 that registration was revoked but stayed, meaning the revocation would take effect only if he broke a five-year probation.

Probation terms in the board file included a psychological evaluation, notice to his employer, weekly monitoring by a California-licensed psychologist, a drug and alcohol recovery program, ongoing treatment, and random drug and alcohol testing. He registered as a psychologist in December 2006. The board granted early termination of probation in May 2008.

From June 2006 to May 2011 he was director of family services at Promises Malibu, a residential program that later closed. In August 2013 he opened Resolutions Living. The clinic and the house grew up as paired Santa Monica businesses: daytime treatment under an accredited psychology corporation, overnight beds in a recovery residence DHCS does not license. His own team page still presents him as founder and executive clinical director with more than 20 years of clinical work in substance use, mood and anxiety disorders, and co-occurring conditions.

None of that 2002-2008 record has been tied by police to the Berkeley Street bedroom. It is the history of the person who built the two-brand model. It is not a finding about how Gerber died.

Toxicology Will Take Months, and Police Want a Supplier

A deputy medical examiner finished an examination on September 21 and deferred cause and manner of death. The office said it will not say what tests were ordered and that deferred cases can take a few months. Until that file closes, “suspected overdose” is a police working theory, not a verdict.

Law enforcement sources said detectives are trying to trace the supplier of the drugs involved and have spoken with other people staying at the house. No one has been charged. Police have said they are not ready to talk about possible charges or about who, if anyone, bears responsibility inside the home.

WHAT WE KNOW

• Time of death: Paramedics pronounced Gerber dead at 9:45 a.m. on September 20, 2026, after officers arrived at 9:35 a.m.
• Police theory: Santa Monica detectives are investigating a suspected overdose and say there is no indication of foul play.
• State license: DHCS has no record of Resolutions Living as a licensed substance-use residential treatment facility and describes it as a recovery residence.
• Nabavi’s credential: His psychologist license is active and listed as expiring June 30, 2028, after a stayed 2006 revocation and early end of probation in May 2008.

WHAT IS UNCONFIRMED

• Official cause: The medical examiner has not issued a cause or manner of death.
• Intake exam: It is not public whether anyone medically or psychologically evaluated Gerber when he arrived about 10 p.m.
• Drug source: Detectives are still trying to learn where any drugs came from.
• On-site services: Whether the house provided a licensable treatment service that night has not been established in a public DHCS action.

Gerber asked for help in public, then walked into a house that sells recovery, staff, and a program while remaining, on paper, a residence. The autopsy is finished. The toxicology is not. The license the state never required is not the file detectives are opening first.