A former morgue manager at Harvard Medical School has been sentenced to eight years in prison for stealing and selling human body parts donated for scientific research, the U.S. Justice Department announced on Tuesday.
Cedric Lodge, 58, pleaded guilty in May to trafficking the stolen remains, which included internal organs, brains, skin, hands, faces, and dissected heads, between 2018 and at least March 2020. He was dismissed from Harvard in May 2023.
Investigators revealed that Lodge, along with his wife Denise, transported the body parts from Harvard’s facilities near Boston to their home in Goffstown, New Hampshire, and other locations in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. The remains were then shipped to buyers in multiple states without the knowledge or consent of Harvard, the donors, or their families.
Denise Lodge, 65, received a one-year prison sentence, according to the Justice Department.
Wayne A. Jacobs, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Philadelphia field office, said, “Today’s sentencing is another step forward in ensuring those who orchestrated and executed this heinous crime are brought to justice.”
The Justice Department noted that many of the human remains sold by the Lodges were later resold for profit. Several of the buyers involved in the trafficking scheme have been sentenced to jail or are awaiting sentencing.
