We have no choice but to trust those who work with the dead. Undertakers, funeral managers, and morgue workers all perform vital functions that most would be squeamish about. But a morgue manager at Harvard Medical School has left observers horrified after his truly demented money-making scheme was exposed.
Enter 58-year-old Cedric Lodge and his wife Denise, who masterminded a literally ghoulish side business in which he profited from selling body parts “as if they were baubles”. Prosecutors alleged that between 2018 and March 2020 they sold two dozen hands, two feet, nine spines, portions of skulls, five dissected human faces, and two dissected heads.
— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) April 20, 2025
HARVARD MORGUE BOSS SOLD BRAINS, SKIN & FACES… UMM?! WHAT?
Cedric Lodge had one job: manage the morgue at Harvard Medical School and make sure donated bodies were used for science.
Instead? He turned the place into Facebook Marketplace for body parts.
From 2018 to 2023,… pic.twitter.com/O6JnHw5Ej1
Assistant U.S. Attorney Alisan Martin singled out two particularly grisly findings she described as the “deeply horrifying reality”. This included Lodge selling human skin that would be tanned and turned into a book cover and, as she detailed:
“Cedric and Denise Lodge sold a man’s face — perhaps to be kept on a shelf, perhaps to be used for something even more disturbing.”
It’s taken years for the prosecutors to get this to court. Now, on Dec 17, five years after their gruesome trade was discovered, the Lodges are behind bars. The pair ultimately pleaded guilty, with Cedric’s defense attorney Patrick Casey telling the sentencing judge:
“Mr. Lodge acknowledges the seriousness of his conduct and the harm his actions have inflicted on both the deceased persons whose bodies he callously degraded and their grieving families.”
Cedric was sentenced to 8 years behind bars. Denise only got a single year, with her attorney claiming her husband “was doing this and she just kind of went along with it”:
What happened here is wrong” but no one lost money and the matter was “more of a moral and ethical dilemma … than a criminal case.”
What exactly is the “moral and ethical dilemma” here, because it seems pretty clear-cut to me!
The buyers face justice
The fiancé of the man who was recently sentenced for his involvement in a human body parts ring is sharing his side of the story and the positive work he's done in the community that she says many have overlooked.https://t.co/4lyEOj9czE
— 6 News (@WJACTV) December 26, 2025
You may also be wondering whether those who bought the remains have faced justice. Well, Cumberland County resident Jeremy Pauley was wrapped up in the scheme and has been sentenced to six years in prison after officials found human remains in his “Olde Curiosities Shoppe” sourced from the Lodges.
In the latest twist, Pauley’s fiancée Sophie Mae Vee is speaking out in his defense, saying Pauley only realized the human remains were from the morgue after the fact:
“Jeremy acquired many human remains for the purpose of conservation and restoration, developing a method of plastination so that these remains may continue to be used in the medical industry and for the education of the public in regard to anatomy and physiology.
Jeremy sold several pieces to help fund the expensive process of preservation, believing what he was providing was out of an educational effort. Some of these remains were found to have originated from these disturbing places, something that has always deeply upset him.”
It seems this grisly story is set to take a few more twists soon, as Pauley’s ex-wife Sarah is apparently facing charges of her own after making jewelry from the Harvard morgue remains. I guess the moral is that there’s always more, and it’s always worse.
