Mark Salling, the former Glee star who last month pleaded guilty to child pornography charges, was found dead today in Los Angeles, a law enforcement official has confirmed to Deadline. The actor was 35.
The source said the death is being investigating by authorities as a possible suicide, and the coroner’s office is waiting to inform his next of kin and family members. His body was found near his home in Sunland, in northern Los Angeles.
The news comes just more than a month after Salling pleaded guilty to a federal offense of possessing child pornography, and ahead of a scheduled March 7 date for his sentencing.
As part of a plea agreement, Salling admitted he possessed some 25,000 images of children engaged in sexual conduct. He faced a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison, but as part of the agreement was expected to spend 4 to 7 years in prison, followed by 20 years of supervised release and registry as a sex offender.
Salling made the plea deal after an investigation resulted in a vast collection of child pornography discovered on a laptop computer, a hard drive, and a USB flash drive. Salling had showed some of the images to a girlfriend, who reported him to the police. He was arrested in December 2015.
(Excerpt) Read More in: Deadline