The former manager of the Harvard Medical School morgue has pleaded guilty in federal court to stealing human remains and selling them to several people, including a Berks County man.
Cedric Lodge, 57, of Goffstown, N.H., pleaded guilty Wednesday before Chief United States District Judge Matthew W. Brann to interstate transport of stolen human remains, according to a release from acting U.S. Attorney John Gurganus of the Middle District of Pennsylvania.
Lodge, who is awaiting sentencing, admitted that from 2018 through at least March 2020 he sold and transported human remains stolen from the morgue in Boston while he was the facility’s manager.
According to the release:
Lodge took 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 transported the remains to his home in New Hampshire.
After he and his wife, Denise Lodge, sold the remains, they would ship them to buyers in other states or the buyer would take possession directly and transport the remains.
Remains stolen and sold by Lodge were transported from the morgue in Boston to locations in Salem, Mass., New Hampshire and Pennsylvania.
Lodge admitted selling remains to Joshua Taylor, 46, of Wernersville, Andrew Ensanian of Montgomery, Lycoming County, and others.
Many of the remains purchased from Lodge were resold for a profit, including to Jeremy Pauley of Susquehanna County, who pleaded guilty in September 2023 to conspiracy and interstate transportation of stolen property.
Taylor pleaded guilty May 15 to interstate transport of stolen human remains.
Taylor admitted he bought the remains that he knew had been stolen from the morgue and transported them from New Hampshire to Pennsylvania from 2018 through 2022. He awaits sentencing.
Officials said these other defendants also have pleaded guilty: Denise Lodge; Matthew Lampi of East Bethel, Minn.; Angelo Pereyra of Wichita, Kan.; and Ensanian.
Lampi was sentenced to 15 months in prison, and Pereyra was sentenced to 18 months in prison.
Denise Lodge and Ensanian are awaiting sentencing.
Also, Candace Chapman-Scott, who stole remains from an Arkansas crematorium where she was employed and sold them to Pauley in Pennsylvania, pleaded guilty in federal court in Arkansas and was sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Source: Berkshire mont
Be First to Comment