A Southern California fertility doctor was convicted Tuesday in the strangulation death of his wife after several years of claiming she fell down a flight of stairs.
An Orange County jury found Eric Scott Sills, 58, guilty of one count of second-degree murder for strangling his 45-year-old wife, Susann Sills.
Sills tried staging his wife’s November 2016 death as an accident at the bottom of the stairs in their San Clemente home, prosecutors said.
He faces up to 15 years to life in state prison when sentenced in March.
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Eric Scott Sills listens during opening statements in Orange County Superior Court in Santa Ana, California in November. Sills was found guilty in the 2016 death of his wife, 45-year-old Susann Sills. (Paul Bersebach/MediaNews Group/Orange County Register via Getty Images)
“Think of how diabolical you have to be – not only to kill your wife but to make it look like she had fallen down the stairs,” Orange County District Attorney Scott Spitzer said. “It took calculated planning to commit this crime, and worse of all he ruthlessly and selfishly murdered the mother of their children who now are left without their parents.”
Sills called 911 on Nov. 13, 2016, saying he woke up to find his wife’s lifeless body after she fell down the stairs. However, Susann Sills was determined to have died by strangulation. Inside the couple’s home, blood stains were found on a wall and curtains in their daughter’s bedroom, prosecutors said.
Susann was sleeping in the room due to a migraine, authorities said. Investigators also found a clump of hair in the room, which apparently indicated there had been a violent struggle between the couple.
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“Dr. Sills was sworn to care for the sick and injured and his chosen profession as a fertility doctor helped bring so much joy to his patients, but the woman he vowed to love in sickness and health was strangled to death by his own hands,” Spitzer said.
Sills was the medical director of the Center for Advanced Genetics fertility clinic in Carlsbad, according to the Orange County Register. His wife was the center’s managing partner and co-founder. They were the parents of twins who were 12 years old at the time of their mother’s death.
Eric Scott Sills reacts during opening statements in Orange County Superior Court. (Paul Bersebach/MediaNews Group/Orange County Register via Getty Images)
Sills practiced in-vitro fertilization in Europe and the U.S., authoring books on the topic, the paper reported, citing an online biography. He was also part of a team that discovered three previously unknown human gene mutations.
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Investigators haven’t determined a motive but said the couple had marital problems and were under financial strain.
She was frustrated with her relationship with her husband’s older children from a previous relationship, and he was “fixated” with a topless photo she posted in a chat room after losing a bet over whether former President Donald Trump would win the Republican nomination for president, prosecutors alleged, according to the newspaper.