Did a topless photograph posted on-line lead a California IVF physician to kill his spouse?

Susann Sills was no shrinking violet, says her buddy Chris Solimine. They’d met whereas each earned an MBA on the College of Miami.  “Susann was … good, witty, sarcastic, however not in a imply means… simply sufficient to dig at you,” he mentioned.  “Extremely pushed, a loyal buddy.”

And he or she was an completed businesswoman. Collectively along with her husband, Dr. Eric “Scott” Sills, a famend fertility specialist, that they had began their very own IVF apply in April 2015. “She began the enterprise … she constructed it,” Solimine mentioned, including, “Susann just about ran every thing apart from truly doing the procedures.”

So, it got here as a shock when he learn the information that Susann Sills had abruptly died on Nov. 13, 2016, from an obvious unintended fall. “It did not appear believable to me that she simply fell down the steps with a migraine headache,” Solimine mentioned. However that was the story Dr. Sills had instructed the 911 operator that morning when he referred to as and reported discovering his spouse face down on the staircase. Solimine says he questioned if there was extra to the story.

Rick Leeds, one other buddy of Susann Sills, mentioned she had left him a troubling message a few month earlier than her demise. “She seemed like she was whispering,” Leeds mentioned. “It was so totally different from the completely happy, jovial, excited voicemails I received earlier than. This one was positively … issues weren’t good.” After they spoke, Leeds mentioned it seemed like there was rigidity over a photograph.  “She mentioned it was a topless photograph of her that had appeared on a … weblog.”  Because it turned out, the topless photograph was one which Susann Sills had posted of herself on a political chatroom referred to as Patrick.web.

“Susann apparently was one of many few girls who was concerned on this discussion board,” in response to former Orange County Sheriff’s Murder Detective Dave Holloway, who was the lead case agent. “She … form of threw out on this discussion board that … if Donald Trump received the presidential nomination, that she would submit an image of her naked breasts,” Holloway mentioned.

Leeds says that when he and Susann Sills spoke, it was clear that, “She and Scott had been in a very rocky place, and that she was enthusiastic about leaving him.” He provides, “No matter was happening between her and Scott … and this image … was simply … a pivotal level for her.”

However Holloway and his group had no concept in regards to the photograph or what, if any, significance it had on Susann Sills’ demise once they arrived on the Sills’ San Clemente residence.

“Susann had accidents to just about her complete physique,” mentioned Holloway. “Her face was all bruised up. Her again was bruised up … each legs and arms … had bruising and abrasions.”

“48 Hours” correspondent Tracy Smith requested, “At that cut-off date that morning November thirteenth, was Scott Sills a sufferer or a suspect?”

“To us … he was a sufferer,” Holloway mentioned. “We had been going to a home the place two children and a husband simply misplaced their spouse and mom.” However as they continued their investigation, the questions would mount.

Smith goes contained in the investigation in an encore of “The Puzzling Demise of Susann Sills,” airing Saturday at 10/9c* on CBS and streaming on Paramount+. (*basketball delay within the east and central time zones/)

Detectives interviewed the couple’s 12-year-old twins, Mary-Katherine and Eric Sills. Everybody described the wedding as “loving.” The youngsters mentioned their mother and father not often fought and had been by no means violent. They usually all confirmed that Susann Sills had been affected by a migraine all weekend. Mary-Katherine, whose room was the quietest, mentioned she had cleaned and tidied it as much as appear like a lodge suite in order that her mother might relaxation, whereas Mary-Katherine slept in her mother and father’ bed room.

In his 911 name, Scott Sills mentioned his spouse’s shoe had come off on the steps, suggesting she had gotten up in the midst of the evening, tripped and fell. A group of things round Susann Sills’ physique appeared to help the story of an unintended fall. There was a big stainless-steel cooking pot, which appeared odd at first, however Susann Sills’ household had defined she would generally carry a bowl when she felt nauseated. And there was an empty bottle of Tramadol, a ache remedy, which Scott Sills mentioned Susann Sills usually took to deal with her migraines. And off to the aspect was a crimson and white scarf. Mary-Katherine instructed investigators her mom had been sporting it round her neck when she was found within the morning. However she had taken it off in order to not impede her mom’s respiration.

Throughout a preliminary examination of Susann Sills’ accidents, the deputy coroner had seen another accidents to her neck that did not seem like according to a fall.  “Her neck had a fairly pronounced ligature mark,” Holloway mentioned,

Smith requested, “Is it potential that she might have fallen down the steps after which someway the headband strangled her?”

“May have caught on a banister … certain, I suppose so,” Holloway mentioned, “however we did not have any proof of that.”

As an alternative, investigators say, they discovered one thing suspicious. There was blood in Mary-Katherine’s room the place Susann Sills had been staying that evening, on the curtains, the wall, and the nightstand. They usually found that Scott Sills, who had been sporting a beanie on his head, had a lower on his head, and a bruise on his forearm. He mentioned he had injured himself whereas engaged on his automobile along with his son Eric. In the meantime Eric instructed the detectives he’d heard his mother and father arguing within the early hours of the morning. Scott Sills admitted he had argued with Susann, however mentioned it was as a result of he was upset that she was working late on her laptop computer, which aggravated her migraines.

Smith requested, “While you got here to the home, it was a demise investigation…By the point you left, was it a homicide investigation?

“No,” mentioned Holloway, “It wasn’t simply as clear-cut as that.”

DNA assessments on the blood within the bed room ultimately got here again optimistic for Scott Sills, with a smudge on the wall that confirmed a combination of each Scott and Susann’s DNA. “They had been each there,” mentioned Holloway, “There is a battle.” And forensic evaluation of Susann’s cellphone steered there was rigidity within the marriage. In texts despatched in late August, lower than three months earlier than her demise, Susann wrote, “I’m trapped” … “You might be killing me” … “I simply need out” and “We simply aren’t proper for one another.”

In November 2017, a 12 months after her demise, the coroner’s workplace cited Susann Sills’ explanation for demise as ligature strangulation, and the style as murder. Dr. Sills was now the prime suspect.

When investigators interviewed Scott Sills once more in August 2018, he denied killing Susann Sills, and for the primary time he supplied a proof for the blood in Mary-Katherine’s room. He mentioned he’d lower himself whereas altering a window display.

However on the day of Susann Sills’ demise, detectives had discovered one thing else — a potential motive. In Scott Sills’ residence workplace was a printout of a web-based change between Susann Sills and a male member of Patrick.web dated Aug. 30, 2016. They had been discussing that topless photograph Susann Sills had posted. The person, who glided by “tenpoundbass” wrote: “All I’ve received to say is you should have an excellent cool Husband.” Susann, aka “turtledove” replied, “He is exhausted, truly. It is not straightforward being married to a girl who’s partially bare and posing, alluringly, on a regular basis …”

Scott Sills had denied printing the chat. However investigators had later discovered a duplicate of the identical change on his cellphone.

“Does this sound like this might result in motive?” requested Smith.

“Sure,” mentioned Holloway. “If it is … one thing that is build up in him, some form of anger … or jealousy about … what his spouse’s doing on-line with out him.”

“Sufficient to kill her?” requested Smith. “Mm-hmm,” Holloway replied. 

In April 2019, Dr. Scott Sills was arrested on his solution to surgical procedure and charged with the alleged homicide of his spouse.

At his trial in late 2023, Sills’ protection legal professional Jack Earley argued there was no motive for homicide. And that topless photograph? He instructed Smith, “It wasn’t a giant deal.”

“It isn’t putting to you that he had this photograph in two locations on his cellphone after which on the printer?” she requested. “No,” he mentioned. “Initially, I do not know actually who printed these items up.”

And Earley supplied a novel concept to elucidate how the forensic pathologist might have discovered ligature strangulation. He mentioned one or each of the household’s canines had tugged on the headband that was wrapped round Susann’s neck after she fell on the steps.

“Mary-Kate … noticed the canines pulling on the headband,” Earley instructed Smith.

“Do you truthfully assume that the canines pulled exhausting sufficient to strangle her to demise?” Smith requested.

“No,” he mentioned. “That was not the principle concept.”  

As an alternative, Earley centered on one other harm recognized in Susann’s post-mortem: a fractured C3 vertebra close to the bottom of the neck, which will be deadly, or no less than have left Susann incapacitated.

 “Their respiration is compromised,” Earley defined. “In the event that they’re then choked, it does not take a lot to kill ’em.”