Mystery in Death of Coach

Grieving students and administrators at Antelope Valley Christian High are still trying to make sense of the apparent suicide of Frank Lawton, a popular basketball coach at the school.

Lawton, 44, was found slumped over in his car Thursday on a remote stretch of road in Lancaster, apparently the victim of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy Jim Hellmold said.

Hellmold said the official cause of death will not be determined until an autopsy report is completed. An investigation is pending.

Lawton was entering his third season as boys’ basketball coach at Antelope Valley Christian. He guided the Eagles to a 25-2 record last season, when they won the Agape League title and reached the final of the Southern Section Division V-A playoffs.

Principal Jim Pratt said ministers were called in to counsel students, who were told of Lawton’s death Thursday by school owner David Ralph.

“Everyone was shocked,” said senior Carl Ligons, who played basketball for Lawton as a sophomore. “Everybody started going crazy, started crying. It was like that Thursday and Friday. He was real popular, especially with the kids.”

Pratt and others said Lawton gave no indication he was having problems.

“It makes no sense whatsoever,” Pratt said. “Not that suicide ever makes sense, but you try to put a reason behind it.

“My reaction was just total disbelief. He had his act together. It disheartens us that we didn’t know what was going on in his personal life, so we could have reached out to him in some way.”

Pratt said Lawton, who was divorced and lived alone in an apartment near the school, occasionally took in male students from broken homes.

Johnny Morales, an All-Southern Section player for Antelope Valley Christian last season, lived with Lawton during the 1995-96 school year, Pratt said.

“He was very giving, all the time, any time,” said Don Moore, athletic director at the school. “He was that way with everybody. I never heard Frank say a bad word about anybody.”

Moore, 64, former boys’ basketball coach at Quartz Hill and Palmdale high schools, had known Lawton since hiring him as an assistant at Quartz Hill in 1982. Moore said he last talked to Lawton two days before Lawton was found dead by passersby near the intersection of 90th Street West and Avenue K.

“It’s still a real shocker to me,” Moore said. “When you have a close friend like that, it’s hard to figure out a rhyme or reason why something like that would happen.

“You never know. [Suicide] happens all the time, but when it’s someone so close to you, it really hurts.”

Moore said Lawton routinely helped set up the public address system and perform other duties before home football games.

There was a moment of silence and prayer in Lawton’s memory Saturday before Antelope Valley Christian’s home game against Bethel Christian.

Lawton, who was a walk-on coach, was employed as a computer specialist at Edwards Air Force Base since 1980.

Moore said Lawton had a brother who lives in Reno.

Eric Mobley, a former student and athlete at Antelope Valley Christian, said he learned of Lawton’s death from one of his teachers at Antelope Valley High. Mobley, a senior, played for Lawton as a sophomore.

“I didn’t believe it at first,” said Mobley, a tailback on the Antelope football team. “He was the last person I’d expect to do something like that. It still don’t seem right.

“He was cool and easy to get along with. He talked to his players. He was a coach you’d want to play for.”

Lawton was known to steer athletes in the right direction. Ligons said his brother, Aaron, benefited from Lawton’s coaching on the basketball team last season. Aaron Ligons attends Chico State, where he is a redshirt freshman on the football team.

“[Lawton] taught Aaron how to work hard and achieve his goals,” said Carl Ligons, whose father Frank is the football coach at Antelope Valley Christian. “He kept his head screwed on straight.”

Lawton’s teams were 42-8 in two seasons. The Eagles brought a 24-0 record into the Division V final last season but lost, 82-60, to Pacific Hills at UC Irvine. Antelope Valley Christian committed 31 turnovers.

“We were really tense out there,” Lawton said after the game.

The Eagles advanced to the second round of the Southern California regional playoffs before losing to Horizon Christian, 84-55.

Carl Ligons said Lawton’s death has caused the 56-student high school to become even closer in the past week.

“Usually everyone has their own little group, but when something like this happens, it makes everyone pull together,” he said.