Mark Salling’s Cause of Death Released by Coroner

Actor died of asphyxia by hanging as he awaited sentencing in his child pornography case

Mark Salling
Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images

Mark Salling, the disgraced “Glee” star whose body was found earlier this week, died of asphyxia by hanging, according to the Los Angeles County coroner’s office.

The manner of death for Salling, who was due to be sentenced in March after pleading guilty in the child pornography case against him, was suicide, the coroner’s office added.

News broke Tuesday that Salling’s body was found in Sunland, Calif. The actor, who played Noah “Puck” Puckerman on the Fox series, was 35. According to TMZ, Salling was found hanging from a tree after police were called to do a “welfare check” and discovered the actor at a baseball field.

The actor pleaded guilty to possessing approximately 25,000 images of children engaged in sexual conduct, the U.S. Department of Justice said in December.

Salling specifically pleaded guilty to one count of possession of child pornography involving a prepubescent.

In October’s plea agreement, Salling acknowledged that he downloaded the images from the internet in 2015 and used software designed to conceal his activity.

The collection was discovered on a laptop computer, a hard drive and a USB flash drive after Salling showed some of the images to a girlfriend, who reported the matter to local enforcement, according to the DOJ.

The charge that Salling pleaded to carries a maximum 20-year prison sentence, but under the plea agreement, the parties agreed that a four to seven-year prison sentence would be appropriate.

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