A doctor and co-founder of an infertility clinic in Carlsbad, California, was arrested last week on suspicion of the murder of his wife – who he claimed he found dead after she allegedly fell down the stairs at their home in 2016.
The Orange County District Attorney and Orange County Sheriff’s Department confirmed Tuesday Dr. Eric Scott Sills, 54, of San Clemente, California, had been arrested on April 25 and charged with one count of murder in the death of Susann Sills, 45.
In the early morning hours of Nov. 13, 2016, OCSD deputies were called to the couple’s home on Via Cancion in San Clemente, a city in Orange County, California, about 25 miles north of Carlsbad. Eric Sills told deputies he had woken up to find his wife dead at the bottom of a staircase after an alleged fall.
The OCSD’s homicide unit launched an investigation into Susann Sill’s death. The department’s coroner division conducted an autopsy.
One year later, in November 2017, after what the OCSD called “an extensive investigation,” officials determined that Susann Sill’s death was not an accident but rather a homicide.
The investigation into the homicide continued for another year-and-a-half. Last month, the OCSD said an arrest warrant was issued for Eric Sills as the suspect in the victim’s killing.
Eric Sills was arrested as he went to work last week and was booked into Orange County Jail. He posted a $1 million bail Monday and was released. The OCSD said Eric Sills is scheduled to appear in court on May 23.
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Eric Sills serves as the medical director at the Center for Advanced Genetics, an infertility clinic in San Diego’s North County. An obituary for Susann Sills published in the Los Angeles Times in December 2016 said she served as managing partner and co-founder of the clinic.
According to a biography published on the clinic’s website, Eric Sills completed a reproductive endocrinology fellowship at Cornell University in 1998 and has been in full-time IVF practice ever since then.
The doctor is described as a “published author, researcher, and lecturer” who is board certified by the American Board of Obstetrics & Gynecology and the National Board of Physicians & Surgeons. He appeared as an expert on an episode of the television show, “The Doctors,” in 2016 in which he discussed a procedure to reverse menopause.
His areas of interest, per his bio, include “reproductive surgery, male factor infertility, low ovarian reserve, and recurrent miscarriage.” Eric Sills graduated from the University of Tennessee in 1992.
Susann Sills’ obituary said the couple had twins, a boy and a girl, and also said Susann had two stepchildren. Her memorial service was held on Dec. 9, 2016, in San Clemente.
NBC 7 reached out to Eric Sills' attorney for comment on the case Wednesday but the attorney said he would not be making any statements to the media at this time.
