Harvard morgue case

In June 2023, Cedric Lodge, his wife and three other individuals were indicted for conspiracy and interstate transport of stolen goods. Lodge, a morgue manager at Harvard Medical School, had access to bodies willed by their owners for academic research. While working at the school he allegedly sold human body parts on the internet.

Harvard Medical School incident
Lodge worked as the morgue manager under the Anatomical Gift Program at Harvard Medical School from 1995 until his firing on May 6, 2023. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania accused of him of conspiracy and interstate transport of stolen goods. From roughly 2018 to 2022, Lodge allegedly delivered human remains by post to customers, who sometimes visited the morgue to choose their preferred body parts. While selling services associated with the cost of procuring cadavers is not illegal in the United States, selling bodies or body parts is.

The parts stolen and sold included heads, brains, skin, bones, vital organs and other human parts. Other reports state that the operation allegedly sold stillborn babies due for cremation. One of the indicted buyers had posted a photo of a real human skull on Instagram and another had purchased skin with the intent to make leather.

On June 14 Cedric and 4 others, including his wife, were indicted by a grand jury on allegations of theft and sale of body parts. The charges includes charges of conspiracy and interstate transport of stolen goods. The case is USA v. Lodge, 23-cr-00159, US District Court, Middle District of Pennsylvania.

On September 8 Jeremy Pauley pleaded guilty to his charges and admitted to his role in a nationwide network buying and selling human remains stolen from Harvard Medical School and an Arkansas mortuary.

The public court case docket shows that Lodge and co-defendants are scheduled for trial no earlier than April 2024.

Harvard
In a memo titled 'An abhorrent betrayal' by the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, George Q. Daley, Harvard condemned the crime as a ‘betrayal’ to the school and donors. Harvard also disclosed that Lodge acted “without the knowledge or permission of HMS”. Lodge was fired. Harvard appointed an external panel to evaluate their anatomical donor program and their morgue policies.

Donors
Paula Peltonovich and her sister Darlene Lynch were children to police officer parents who had willed their bodies to science. On getting the news that the remains of their father, who died in 2019, were among those reported stolen, they requested the withdrawal of their mother's body, who died in March 2023, from the school.