NASTY: Harvard Med Staffer Pleads Guilty To Selling Human Remains From Morgue

So much for the ‘hallowed’ in those ‘hallowed laws of higher learning’. We already suspected nothing was sacred there, but we could hardly have guessed that attitude extended to human remains.

Most of us, if encountering human remains might reflect on the person that might once have been, the hole they leave behind in their world, the loss to loved ones. Some of us might reflect on our own mortality and life decisions. Very few of us would look at a corpse and ask ourselves how to turn it into a side-hustle.

But for one 57yo manager at a morgue at Harvard Medical School, that’s exactly what came to mind. Instead of faithfully disposing of the remains after they had been used for teaching or studies, he diverted the various organs for resale. And now, he will face the consequences of his crimes.

The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania announced that Cedric Lodge, age 57, of Goffstown, New Hampshire, pled guilty yesterday before Chief United States District Judge Matthew W. Brann to interstate transport of stolen human remains.

According to Acting United States Attorney John Gurganus, Lodge admitted that, from 2018 through at least March 2020, he participated in the sale and interstate transport of human remains stolen from Harvard Medical School morgue, located in Boston, Massachusetts. Lodge, who was then employed as the manager of the Harvard Medical School Morgue, removed human remains, including organs, brains, skin, hands, faces, dissected heads, and other parts, from donated cadavers after they had been used for research and teaching purposes but before they could be disposed of according to the anatomical gift donation agreement between the donor and the school. Lodge took the remains without the knowledge or permission of his employer, the donor, or the donor’s family, and transport the remains to his home in New Hampshire. After he and his wife Denise Lodge sold the remains, they would ship the remains to the buyers in other states or the buyer would take possession directly and transport the remains themselves. Remains stolen and sold by Lodge were transported from the morgue in Boston to locations in Salem, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Pennsylvania.

Lodge admitted to having sold remains to Joshua Taylor and Andrew Ensanian, among others. Many of the remains purchased from Lodge were resold for a profit, including to Jeremy Pauley, who previously entered a guilty plea to conspiracy and interstate transportation of stolen human remains. —DOJ

The maximum sentence for the crime is 10 years of prison, together with supervised release and a fine.