New Zealand broadcast star Charlotte Dawson has been found dead at her Sydney home.
Australian police say there were no suspicious circumstances.
The 47-year-old – who became a television star on both sides of the Tasman – had a highly public battle with depression.
She was treated in August 2012 following a suicide attempt.
She also struggled on social media where trolls viciously attacked her on both Facebook and Twitter.
Sydney police say they were called to her apartment on Woolloomooloo wharf at 11.18am (NZT 1.18pm).
Australian media say a security guard found her body.
Dawson’s New Zealand television credits include chat show How’s Life, Prime’s Getaway and Charlotte’s Lists. Across the Tasman, she was a judge in Australia’s Next Top Model and a host of reality boxing show The Contender Australia.
Dawson was an ambassador for Angels Goal, a group to promote awareness and prevention of bullying in schools and sporting organisations and is a mentor for Community Brave, a foundation set up to eradicate online bullying.
Her battle with depression saw many media accounts on her, including reports last November that she had dropped her Australian management company after it said it was increasingly difficult to promote a client with a history of mental illness.
She had just been in a Sydney hospital following an anxiety attack.
She had received an email from Chic Celebrity Management this week saying her outspokenness on a variety of issues – including mental health – was undermining its ability to sell her “brand”.
“I always thought that they were very supportive of my condition, I don’t know what to say,” Dawson said after posting an extract of the email on Instagram.
In the email, the company said: “The Chic team do feel that you are damaging your brand by many of the opinions you express and the intimate insights you give into your personal life, and we believe it is making it extremely difficult for Chic to generate business for you.”
It said her brand was no longer seen as aspirational.
Dawson responded: “Brand I’m a human & I share my highs & lows to relate to everyone Is this what management has come to Disgraceful.”
Last year she confronted several of the trolls who had attacked her on Twitter for Australia’s Seven News.
“The thing that I got out of visiting these people and them agreeing to talk to us is the fact that their online bravado is completely polar opposite to what they are, ” Dawson said in the report.
In response to criticism that the TV report was pure publicity seeking and a form of bullying in itself, Dawson said: “I did the story… for a sense of closure and ownership. The message is that if you want that freedom of speech and you want to lash out at people, well, you can be easily traced and if someone wants to find you, they can.”
After the television show she was taken to St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney after police were called to her inner-city home in Sydney at 3.05am local time.
Ad Feedback
Those appearances prompted many more Twitter followers to call for her to “please go hang yourself”.
Just an hour before an ambulance was called to her home, Dawson posted: “Hope this ends the misery” and “You win x”.
That was after enduring a barrage of tweets containing pornographic images, pictures of dead bodies, and vile messages.
Dawson was involved in a public spat with television entrepreneur Julie Christie.
“There’s a long history between us,” Dawson told Sunday News.
“I’ve had run-ins with her before and I’ve absolutely not a shred of respect for her because she’s a bully.
Celebrities and fans have been quick to voice their sorrow on Twitter.
