TMZ Reports Mark Salling Dead of Apparent Suicide

Former Glee actor Mark Salling is dead at age 35, a source confirms to the Hollywood Reporter. It wasn't able to obtain a cause of death, but TMZ is reporting the death is an apparent suicide ahead of Salling's sentencing for child pornography. A law enforcement official in Los Angeles tells the AP that Salling was found hanging after being reported missing about 3am Tuesday. TMZ reports his body was found in a baseball field, hanging from a tree. "I can confirm that Mark Salling passed away early this morning," says the actor's attorney, Michael Proctor. "Mark was a gentle and loving person, a person of great creativity, who was doing his best to atone for some serious mistakes and errors of judgment," he adds.

Salling, known to Glee fans as Noah "Puck" Puckerman, was scheduled to be sentenced March 7 following his guilty plea on child porn charges. He was facing four to seven years. Salling was arrested in late 2015 after child-porn images were found on his computer, with the Hollywood Reporter noting a search warrant uncovered more than 50,000 such images there and on a thumb drive. People notes that per court documents, a former girlfriend had tipped off police. (More Mark Salling stories.)