What independent reporting has been done into the timeline between the Conan O’Brien party and the Reiner deaths?

1. What reporters have reconstructed so far — a patchwork timeline

Major news organizations — notably the Los Angeles Times and The New York Times — have reported that Nick Reiner attended Conan O’Brien’s Dec. 13 party with his parents and that he behaved erratically there, prompting at least one heated exchange with his father; those outlets say investigators are now tracing Nick’s movements from when he left the party to his arrest that night, and that the medical examiner is determining exact times of death ^{[4] [1] [5] [3]}.

2. Sources and methods: anonymous attendees, law‑enforcement threads

Independent reporting has leaned heavily on anonymous attendees to describe behavior at O’Brien’s party — accounts published by The New York Times, NBC, People and others portray Nick as “acting strangely” or making guests uncomfortable — while police briefings and court filings have supplied the investigatory backbone (arrest location, hotel check‑ins, and that officers were following Nick’s travels after the party) that reporters stitch onto those witness accounts ^{[6] [7] [3]}.

3. Where accounts agree and where they sharply diverge

There is broad agreement that the Reiners attended the party, left the gathering that night and that the couple were found dead the following day; beyond that journalists diverge: several outlets cite witnesses who say there was a “very loud argument” between Rob and Nick at O’Brien’s home ^{[8] [7] [9]}, while TheWrap published sources disputing that a blow‑up occurred and emphasized that no attendee has spoken on the record ^[2]. Law enforcement reporting consistently states investigators are examining Nick’s whereabouts from departure through arrest, and that the medical examiner has been asked to fix time of death — but those official threads do not confirm the party argument as the proximate cause of events ^{[3] [1]}.

4. Corroboration gaps and why timelines remain provisional

Independent reporting is constrained by key gaps: no partygoer has gone on the record to map a continuous chain of events from O’Brien’s house to the Reiners’ deaths, the medical examiner had not publicly released definitive times of death in the early reporting, and prosecutors may still subpoena guest lists or witnesses — meaning much of the published timeline rests on unnamed sources and police statements about investigative leads, not on confirmed forensic anchors in the public record ^{[2] [3] [1]}.

5. Sensational claims, competing agendas, and the media ecology

Tabloid and online outlets have circulated dramatic specifics — for example, claims that O’Brien stopped guests from calling 911 — that rely on unnamed insiders and have been contradicted or left unverified by more cautious outlets; legacy papers and broadcast outlets have been more measured, flagging the limits of anonymous sourcing and law‑enforcement constraints, while trade publications note Hollywood’s reluctance to supply on‑the‑record witnesses, an implicit protective dynamic that shapes what independent reporters can confirm ^{[8] [2] [10]}.

6. What independent reporting is likely to add next

The next independent developments to watch for are (and have been identified by reporters): release of the medical examiner’s time‑of‑death findings, any subpoenas or witness lists produced by prosecutors that could name party attendees under oath, and corroborating surveillance, hotel or cell‑phone location records that law enforcement has signaled it is pursuing to close the chronology from the party to the arrest — steps that would move reporting from competing anecdotes toward a documented timeline ^{[3] [1] [2]}.