AP Features, June 11th, 2007
A former New Orleans police officer accused of beating a retired schoolteacher shortly after Hurricane Katrina was found dead of a gunshot wound Sunday night in an apparent suicide.
The body of Lance Schilling, 30, was found at a home in suburban Metairie. The Jefferson Parish coroner's office performed an autopsy Monday, determining Schilling died of a gunshot wound to the roof of the mouth.
The Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office would provide few details. Sheriff's spokesman Col. John Fortunato said department policy prohibited discussion of details of a suicide unless it happened in a public place.
Schilling and former officer Robert Evangelist were accused of beating Robert Davis, 64, who had returned to New Orleans to check on his property in October 2005.
The beating incident on Bourbon Street in the city's French Quarter was captured on videotape by an Associated Press Television News team the night of October 8, 2005.
The tape shows Davis being kneed and struck at least four times on the head by two police officers. He flailed and twisted as he was dragged to the sidewalk, where he lay bleeding.
Davis was booked on municipal charges of public intoxication, resisting arrest, battery on a police officer and public intimidation. All charges were later dropped. He has said he does not drink and that he was looking for a store to buy cigarettes when police grabbed him.
Schilling's attorney, Franz Zibilich, said he was saddened by his client's death and believed the suspected suicide had no connection to the pending trial, which had been set for June 29.
"The truth be known, he was looking forward to having this matter tried and heard," Zibilich said.
New Orleans police spokesman Marlon Defillo said Schilling had not been with the department since December 2005.
