The man who spent more than $100k on plastic surgeries to resemble pop singer Justin Bieber has died, TMZ reports.
35-year-old Toby Sheldon achieved a degree of notoriety after appearing on the reality shows Botched and My Strange Addiction, where he talked about his obsession with looking like his favorite pop singer, who he described as “perfect” and “extraordinary beautiful.” In 2o14, he released his first single, “Justified,” with musician Adam Barta, an EDM song and ode to Bieber.
Sheldon’s body was discovered in a room at a Motel 6 in the San Fernando Valley on August 21. He had been reported missing since August 18. Police initially thought his disappearance was in connection to a recent breakup with his boyfriend. Drugs were found in the motel room, though it’s still unclear how exactly Sheldon died.
Since the news broke, friends and fans of Sheldon have been mourning on Twitter:
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My deepest condolences go out to the family of Toby Sheldon. He was good person with a great heart.
— Dr. Paul S. Nassif (@DrPaulNassif) August 27, 2015
So sad 🙁 Am sorry that he never found the happiness he was searching for. Deepest condolences to his friends & family #RIP #TobySheldon
— Danielle Fidget (@RingsideFidget) August 27, 2015
So sad. #JustinBieber lookalike #TobySheldon found dead http://t.co/074VgGibWj pic.twitter.com/CvyRUEOuj8 — Perez Hilton (@PerezHilton) August 26, 2015
Rest in Peace #TobySheldon ?? You will be missed and forever remembered. ? — Nathan Morrow (@iamNathanMorrow) August 26, 2015
I’m really saddened and devastated hearing the news of the loss of my friend and fellow #plastic Toby… https://t.co/SO22BWZAU3 — Adam Guerra (@venusdlite) August 27, 2015
Rest peacefully, #TobySheldon – you showed us all to be who we are. Even if it was incredibly weird ? — Jake. (@_lordjake) August 26, 2015
Devastated about Toby (aka Tobias Strebel). He was an amazing person & songwriter. Honored to have worked w/him. Passion like #JustinBieber — Adam Barta (@Adam_Barta) August 27, 2015
Timothy Gordon
Again?
William Meyer
He wasted his money.
Peter McKinney
Sad person. Never looked a bit like him.
Jeff Taylor
He obviously had major mental problems/issues.
Corey Eymann
dude looks gross, would not smash. Someone obviously did though, ugh!
Sidney Davies
thank goodness
Cam
Could afford $100,000 for surgery and ended up in a Motel 6? Sad Life. A shame that some of those surgeons didn’t suggest counseling instead of just accepting the money.
ingyaom
“Justin Beiber look-alike”? That guy doesn’t look anything like a lesbian.
Manny Yoko
He looks more like Bette Midler
MarionPaige
could this Toby Sheldon have symbolized this “gay man” that towleroad was claiming as a reader? I mean, Sheldon was a gay man with disposable income and he clearly had the interests of a 16 year old girl; the classic Towleroad Gay Man.
Cam
@MarionPaige: Huh?
Spike
Being found dead in a Motel 6 in the Valley – – – doesn’t get much worse then that!
onthemark
The $100,000 wasn’t nearly enough.
@ingyaom: LOL.
Kangol
A sad story. If you see pictures of him before his failed attempt to transform himself into Justin Bieber, he was clearly an attractive young man. But his psychological issues clearly overwhelmed him.
Martin ZinZin LeBouthillier
Someone thought it was Justin and killed him
Alex Carnes
Sad. The surgery he got was unusual but I would put it in the same category as other body modifications like lots of tattoos or piercings.
jwtraveler
@Cam: Uh-huh!
Stache99
No condolences from the Biebs. What a jerk!
Ladbrook
His existence (and his fate) says just as much about the surgeons who indulged him as it does about him. A normal, well-adjusted adult might say, “here’s 30,000… make me a better version of myself. Fix my nose, my chin, whatever, but just make me look better.”
The plastic surgery community needs to stop kowtowing to these people, and instead recommend them to a serious, in-patient counseling program. Anyone ever watched the loons on youtube who bill themselves as the human Barbie or the human Ken? Ugh.
Glücklich
Bieb-bye Felicia!
Some people really are too stupid to live.
Stache99
Why is it that it’s always gay men that have these issues. You just never hear these stories about straight guys.
Captain Obvious
Lets all make fun of mental illness.
Glücklich
@Cam:
Probably begged, borrowed and stole to scrape together that money – *there’re* some creditors who’ll never get repaid. You can’t throw cash down a toilet and expect to die in the Ritz Carlton.
RIGay
No one ever heard of an intervention on the West coast? What a shame; what a waste of life and money.
I wonder how much of his low self-esteem was driven by the Ex wanting to sleep with Justin Beeber?
David Red
from embarrassment
Christopher Leiva
Wow. These comments are fucking cold. I don’t get why there’s a serious lack of empathy in the world. Must be nice to live such an issueless existence.
tallfithndsmsxy1
Wow… forget the fact that he was a human being that died tragically and possibly alone. And all you some of you people can talk about is how he looks. Obviously the man had self esteem issues, but just the lack of common respect for human life is disheartening. It’s people like you that make people like that go and off do things to themselves. Sad we don’t even need outsiders to gay bash cause most gays are the most horrific gay bashers. hypocrites… go figure. God bless those that are perfect and able to throw stones…
Kevin J Desmond
Sad .. but I knew he was gonna be found dead, why would anybody in his right mind want to look like Justina Bieber
Pj Hutchinson
He’s fucking dead! Show some damn respect and remorse!
PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS
Not so bright light turned off at Motel 6…………………..
tallfithndsmsxy1
@Pj Hutchinson:
PJ seems like that’s a lost cause… don’t think may know about respect and remorse.. sad to say. If it were a porn star or someone hot.. remorse, tears and sorrow would pour like rain..
Billy Budd
He had ISSUES, guys.
Desert Boy
A sad, lost soul. Imagine how much happier he might have been if he invested that staggering $100,000 in psychotherapy to become a whole person?
Giancarlo85
Plastic surgery cannot fix internal and emotional issues. This is a sad story. I am not going to make fun of this guy. He should have invested that money into trying to sort out his issues and also maybe investing it.
Robert Litman
What a fucking waste of money….and a life.
SeeingAll
@Captain Obvious: You’re correct. It’s really a sad case.
Christian Jonathan Lemery
It is wrong to murder!
Robert Earl Guddy
May his killer know what karma is. You people have some shallow ASS comments about someone who just past away . The next time you have a loved one pass, let me know so I can be just as shallow and a p.o.s like some of you guys. His money, let me guess, people have to spend their money how others see fit on how they should or shouldn’t look
AJ BlkWidow
He wasn’t gay, on the botched tv show he said he had a girlfriend. Rip Toby
Sam D. Maloney
Poor guy– pity he didn’t spend the money on counseling, instead.
Jack Anthony Owen
Whatever who cares!
Gary Franklyn Mosby
Now that money result went to waste!
Brian Cherry
Nothing in the article suggests he was murdered.
He was found with drugs, so probably an overdose.
John Kuehnle
I saw him on Botched, he said he had a girlfriend, they said he was upset about his boyfriend, guess he was bisexual, shame, so young, RIP
Avery Alvarez
Another victim of body dismorphia.
Too bad he wasn’t a rent boy. Then we could all be outraged and make it the biggest LGBT issue ever.
Oh, we shallow and vapid gays.
Finrod
@Manny Yoko: “He looks more like Bette Midler”
Rebel Wilson.
Chris Dexter
Well… He got what paid for ð???
Louis
My GoD the callous heartless and sociopathic comments on this site are deplorable ugh.
Rip troubled soul hope you finally found the peace you were sadly unable to find in life.
Heart goes out to his loved ones.
Stache99
@Avery Alvarez: If you’re going to say something mean and bitchy at least be funny. Just saying..
rickperryisgay
This is gross and i don’t care.
Every time i saw this thing on tv i got creeped out
It’s about as bad as that child molester that got all those miley tattoo
Dieter Michaels
vaccuum all that silicone out of him and get some money back.
rickperryisgay
Ding dong the witch is dead comes to mind
Billy Budd
He was clearly insane. Drug use was just a consequence of his problems.
Misty Bolling
Sad on both accounts, his death, and choice to look like Justin Bieber
Glücklich
@rickperryisgay:
I was thinking the Frau Blücher scene from “Young Frankenstein”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdIID_TGwhM
Lotta Yadayada
So?
Louis
God some of you are sick yourselves I only hope when you individuals die that people show you all more compassion and empathy then you showed this young man.
The lack of empathy within this community is astonishing.
Loren Michel
I’m very curious what happened, if it was intentional or not !
sportyguy1983
That picture makes him look like an ugly looking lesbian
Jacob23
This man was a respected member of the TransCelebrity community. Yes, he may have been assigned at birth the identity of regular, boring non-celebrity. But he felt like Justin Bieber and being Bieber is not about having Bieber DNA or having a father named Bieber. It is about what is between your ears. And having hair that covers the ears.
Why should anyone be forced to accept that they aren’t Justin Bieber when it is so much easier to alter their body surgically and pretend that their debut single is going to be as big as “Baby”?
We need to add another T to LGBTQQIAAUPNGC to include TransCelebrity people and we need to deand that HRC lobbies the federal government for taxpayer funded Bieber-related surgery.
aliengod
What a waste of $100,000. This whacko looked nothing like Justin Bieber.
Glücklich
@Jacob23:
BEST COMMENT ON HERE!
BigG
Very sad life. Really sucks he spent all that money on drugs and surgery vs. Mental health
onthemark
The people who think we shouldn’t make fun of this situation should check out a “Mary Tyler Moore Show” from about 1975.
Chuckles the Clown is killed in an unusual fashion. He is the grand marshal of a parade, in a peanut costume, when he is shucked to death by an elephant. Mary berates her friends for finding any humor whatsoever in this. But when they all get to the funeral, everyone is completely somber. Except for Mary who suddenly can’t stop laughing.
Some of you guys here could spend $100,000 and buy a sense of humor.
@Jacob23: LOL. Wow, Jacob, that’s you? And I’ve hated every single one of your comments to date – except this one! Kudos.
asby
On Botched did he not say he had a girlfriend? And didn’t they show him in a scene with her talking about his surgery?….
Stache99
@asby: He never identified as gay. Strange when I’m sure most just assumed.
Glücklich
@onthemark:
Hear! Hear!
Louis
@onthemark: Only sociopaths find death funny and you are an unfortunate but classic example of that I’m afraid.
It’s called empathy also not all of us were born to think everything even death or murder were something to laugh at.
The childish and infantile attitudes speak for themselves with you people.
Please spare me the pedantic and highly predictable bs of growing a thicker skin or having a sense of humor that’s been done to death by you so called classy individuals within this community.
Smh.
Louis
@onthemark: You Also spoke of a tv show from the freaking 60’s so that’s neither here nor there nor does it correlate to REAL LIFE either.
onthemark
@Louis: So you’re saying that fiction never has anything to do with “REAL LIFE”? Yup, I seem to recall Ibsen or Chekhov or Edith Wharton saying that. Somebody like that.
As for death itself, well, we all die sometime. (It’s not entirely clear from your comments that you are aware of this fact.) Haven’t you ever been to a wake? People often laugh at wakes. For all your pompous, prissy lecturing, you sound like you’ve never known anyone who ever died.
If it’s terribly important to someone NOT to look ridiculous when he dies, it’s probably a good idea for him, for instance, oh I don’t know, for instance… not to spend $100,000 trying to look like Justin Bieber (and with amusingly little success, I might add), and not to do methamphetamines which I’m guessing is what he was doing at the end. These were choices. Death is inevitable, but how you get there is often at least somewhat of a choice.
As for you – judging by your picture, you seem to have a severe case of constipation. That can lead to colon cancer so you might want to get some milk of magnesia, prune juice, and maybe some hummus if you like that stuff.
Chris
@onthemark: A clown, being killed by an elephant is so surreal that laughter is more than forgivable. And since Chuckles was about making people laugh, there was something fitting about the laughter.
A young man dying, possibly alone and likely of a drug overdose, in a Motel 6 is just sad. His having spent so much money to look like someone else was simply the hook that made his death something newsworthy but not laughable.
I hope he found some measure of peace and that his family can remember him on better terms than he is being portrayed by the media and mocked by so many people.
Bob LaBlah
If that was the end result his $100k was wasted. Bieber can’t dance (I do think he can sing though) but he is cute. He (Bieber) has an even cuter ass. This guy had serious problems that needed addressing.
Louis
@onthemark: Look here you pompous son of a bitch I definitely know all about death my father died from sepsis in 2011 and to this day that pain ripples within our family and lives so put a muzzle on that mouth of yours before you even attempt to think you know me much less what I think.
Get a life and get over yourself also your attitude is pathetic as it always is with people like you acting so smug and superior simply because some of us aren’t stupid enough to rationalize the fact that many of you here thought mocking this mans life and how he looked and his mental difficulties were humorous.
Thank god some of us have more class and integrity then people like you ever will have or do in general.
Now with that being said feel free to respond with your oh so predictable crap attempting to mock people acting like that makes you superior and special.
No simpleton a tv show is not real life unless its BASED upon real life and Mary Tyler Moore was a fictional sitcom and Im sure Moore wouldn’t have done the same thing in real life as she did when she was ACTING on that episode on a fictional tv show based on a fictional tv character.
What an insensitive little fool.
Louis
@onthemark: That’s not even me in that picture you idiot that’s Billy Eichner a gay comedian someone I also don’t respect considering he goes for the mean spirited comedy im sure you would be great friends with him in that regard.
Anyways im done with you at this point grow up and get over your delusions of grandeur you aren’t special because you think its funny to mock how someone else looks much less how they lived their lives either.
Pathetic.
Some people in this community I swear always one rationalization or justification after another constantly. Smh.
onthemark
@Chris: Was he totally unaware of the ridiculousness of the situation he created? I find that difficult to believe. Personally I’d never heard of him before, but some posters are familiar with him from his “reality” shows (“reality” being quite an ironic term in this case). As I said, people commonly laugh at wakes, and those are the friends/relatives who actually knew the person.
I don’t understand the fastidiousness prissiness here. He was a celebrity of a minor sort. He’s dead and it’s not like he’s going to read what we write here. His friends (I assume he has some) & relatives must be aware of what a flake he was. And I think Louis is taking it a self-hating homophobic step further by blaming “the gay community” for being supposedly meaner than regular (i.e. straight) people, which is about as out of touch with reality as you can get.
onthemark
@Louis: Ah yes – you’re still blaming “this community” I see.
Louis
@onthemark: There are rules on this site for a reason and once again your ego speaks for itself.
You don’t have a conscience just a macho attitude which makes you think you are superior in some fashion or another.
Hence why I used the words delusions of grandeur and yes I most definitely hold those within this community consistently accountable for how they treat others and speak to others.
Apparently your parents didn’t raise you right in that regard mine did however but you don’t deserve respect considering you aren’t even logically capable of comprehending that concept much less showing it to begin with.
Keep acting like a 2 year old though by all means I wont stop you .
You have bored me enough at this point. Predictable sad and petty.
Thankfully I can look at myself in the mirror and go to bed at night with a clear conscience and of course you can because you NEVER say or do anything wrong.
There goes those delusions of grandeur again. Smh.
Louis
@onthemark: Your comment was idiotic and asinine considering its people like you that are always harping and carrying on about the discrimination we face from the heterosexuals yet you think you can justify your equal discriminatory attitude and pathetic bullying attitude as people like you always do.
The more you open your mouth the more you put your foot into it enjoy being an unconscionable human being thankfully Im better then that.
You sir are a perfect example of a hypocrite of the worst kind .
You’re the kind who if a child falls off their bike and scrapes themselves and cries you would respond for them to suck it up that life’s difficult and you are gonna fall so grow a thicker skin and get back up etc…
Typical.
Some of you are truly an embarrassment.
Cue the predictable responses that prove my point.
onthemark
@Louis: “Anyways I’m done with you…” Promises, promises! (And you made that promise quite awhile back.)
I don’t get why you’re accusing ME of “moral superiority” when you’re the one being the prissy preacher with a stick up your butt. I’m not even feeling superior, much, about the drug angle. When I was 35 I still did drugs but if I’d miscalculated and ended up dead, that would have been my fault, and my friends would have made fun (and been right).
You misunderstand the nature of celebrity. Both in a legal and a practical sense. This guy wasn’t just a regular private person anymore. He went out of his way to become a celebrity. You seem to want to have it both ways, somehow. Yes – celebrities DO need a “thicker skin.” Non-celebrities like you and me do not (necessarily), and I never said we did.
@Chris: “Chuckles was all about making people laugh”… as opposed to turning yourself into a Bieber lookalike and making people… do what, exactly? Be awestruck? Throw rose petals? Did he really think they wouldn’t laugh? Let’s give him some credit here. He wanted to make people laugh. I give him more credit than Louis does.
onthemark
@Louis: Hopefully you’ve gone back to polishing your tinfoil hats. But for anyone still reading, I did notice your weird analogy:
“You’re the kind who if a child falls off their bike and scrapes themselves and cries you would respond for them to suck it up that life’s difficult and you are gonna fall so grow a thicker skin and get back up etc…”
Well, uh… yeah. What’s wrong with that? Sounds like responsible parenting. Otherwise the kid might end up being afraid to EVER ride a bike again. That would probably be your approach: “oh poor baby, did um scwape you knee, oh no you don’t evoh have to twy to wide a bike again!” You’d be the ultimate modern “helicopter parent” and try to be your kid’s college dorm roommate, and later go with him/her on job interviews.
But no, I never claimed that regular non-celebrity people need “thicker skin.” Don’t know why you’re imagining that. Celebrities do need to have thicker skin, though; they need to get used to criticism and being made fun of.
Louis
@onthemark: You are such a sad individual I never should have wasted my time with your sarcastic boring self.
Interesting that Qt intentionally spams what I responded to you with yet allows you to be a jerk with no repercussions.
Thankfully I disassociate myself from gay men like you …always.
1EqualityUSA
Louis, you are a good egg.
onthemark
@Louis: I sincerely hope the *straight community* will give you a medal for not being one of THOSE gay men.
You are a self-hating homophobic nutbag.