David Vander Meer died just hours before he was due to make his first court appearance after being charged with the murder of his wife Bernadette Vander Meer

The cheating pastor who allegedly shoved his wife off a mile-high mountain left a handwritten suicide note in his jail cell, according to authorities.

David Vander Meer, 49, was discovered “lying face down on the ground and unresponsive” in his jail cell at the Clark County Detention Center (CCDC) at 9:30 p.m. on June 24, according to a case report from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department obtained by PEOPLE.

He had been booked into the facility two days earlier after being arrested for the murder of his wife Bernadette Vander Meer 20 years prior.

Bernadette was just 29 on Aug. 22, 2006, when David pushed her off of Angels Landing, a rock formation in Utah’s Zion National Park with a 5,760-foot summit.

The couple had taken the trip to celebrate their tenth anniversary, and David later cashed in on his wife’s life insurance policy while setting up a new life for himself with his teenage mistress.

David was placed into a single-occupant cell after arriving at the CCDC, where he had been placed into protective custody, according to the report.

Officer J. Shulz said David was “sitting upright and awake” when he checked the cell 30 minutes prior to discovering his lifeless body.

The exact nature of David’s injuries has been redacted from the report, but it does note that Shulz alerted fellow officers as he began to perform lifesaving measures until emergency medical personnel arrived on the scene.

David was declared dead at 2:36 a.m. on June 25 at the University Medical Center, according to the report, which does not say at what time he was transported from the jail to the medical facility.

A search of David’s cell after his death led to the discovery of a handwritten suicide note as well as a handwritten will, according to the report.

The contents of both the note and will are redacted from the report.

David did not exhibit suicidal ideations during his initial screenings at the facility, according to the report, and had no known medical conditions.

He was facing the possibility of life in prison after being charged with the murder of Bernadette, and severe financial penalties for the insurance fraud he allegedly committed when he cashed in on her life insurance policy just months after her death.

In the wake of his death, both of those charges were dropped by the Washington County Attorney’s Office.

David had been scheduled to make his first court appearance just a few hours after his death to set a timeline for his extradition to Utah.

The medical examiner has yet to release the cause or manner of death as of July 9.

Source: https://people.com/cheating-pastor-left-suicide-note-pushed-wife-off-cliff-12015027