A former manager of the Harvard Medical School morgue has been sentenced to eight years in prison after a chilling investigation revealed he sold brain, skin, hands and faces to buyers in Pennsylvania and beyond.
The Sentencing
On Tuesday, Cedric Lodge, 58, of Goffstown, New Hampshire, and his wife Denise were heard in federal court in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Lodge received an eight‑year prison term, while Denise was sentenced to just over a year. The case followed a plea agreement Lodge filed with prosecutors two years after his arrest.
The Crimes
Authorities said Lodge was at the center of a ghoulish scheme in which he shipped body parts to buyers after donated cadavers were no longer needed for research. In one example, he provided skin to a buyer so it could be tanned into leather and bound into a book, a “deeply horrifying reality,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Alisan Martin said in a court filing. “In another, 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,” Martin added. She said Lodge treated the parts of “beloved human beings as if they were baubles to be sold for profit” and collected thousands of dollars, from 2018 through March 2020.
Background and Response
Lodge had been a morgue manager for 28 years. He acknowledged removing body parts before cremation, a practice that violated the normal protocol of returning bodies to families or cremating them after use. In a court filing, defense attorney Patrick Casey described Lodge’s actions as “egregious.” “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,” Casey said.
Harvard suspended the donation of bodies for five months in 2023 when charges were filed. Prosecutors said at least six other people, including an employee at an Arkansas crematorium, have pleaded guilty in the investigation of body‑parts trafficking.
Key Takeaways
- Cedric Lodge, former Harvard morgue manager, sentenced to 8 years for selling body parts.
- Denise Lodge received a sentence of just over one year for assisting.
- The case involved shipments of brain, skin, hands, and faces to buyers in Pennsylvania and elsewhere.
The court hearing was corrected to Williamsport, Pennsylvania, not Scranton, Pennsylvania, ensuring the record accurately reflects the jurisdiction of the proceedings.
