Human remains seller connected to Harvard Medical School thefts sentenced to 6 years in prison

A central figure in the sprawling, nationwide network of human remains trading that ensnared Harvard Medical School was sentenced in federal court to six years in prison.

Jeremy Pauley, who lives in rural Pennsylvania, is a fixture in the online oddities trade. He’s known in the community for binding books in human skin and preserving fetal remains. Pauley admitted to buying fetuses, skin, hearts and brains from a mortuary worker in Arkansas and purchasing skin and organs sourced secondhand from Harvard Medical School.

Through his macabre businesses, prosecutors estimated he made between $250,000 and $550,000.

The Middle District of Pennsylvania’s Judge Matthew Brann handed down the sentence — which included a $2,000 fine and three years of supervised release — to Pauley on Monday, capping a more than three-year case against him. Pauley was ordered to report to prison on Jan. 16.

Jeremy Pauley, after his arrest in 2022. (East Pennsboro Township Police Dept. via AP)

It was Pauley’s arrest by local police in 2022 that exposed the underground body parts marketplace where buyers and sellers used Facebook, PayPal and the U.S. Postal Service to advertise, sell, trade and ship body parts across the country. Nine people were ultimately charged, with body parts sourced and stolen from a mortuary in Arkansas, a hospital in Kansas and Harvard Medical School in Boston.

But even after pleading guilty in federal court in 2023 to charges of conspiracy and interstate transport of stolen goods, Pauley “leaned in,” federal prosecutors wrote recently, and continued to trade in stolen human remains. He and his partner opened a shop that sells human bones, among other “curiosities.”

“Pauley relishes his position as a notorious, financially successful trafficker of human remains,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum filed last week. “Pauley continues to seek out and occupy a central place within the market and sale of human remains and other so-called ‘oddities.’ “

Prosecutors alleged Pauley purchased “bodies of dead babies,” pointing to social media posts that they filed under seal. They sought a 15-year sentence and $20,000 fine against Pauley.

“Driven by some combination of narcissism and sociopathy, Pauley believes his bizarre ideation with human remains and the human body override the rights of those actual people and the people who loved them,” prosecutors wrote. “He was and is proud of his work. He was and is proud of his collection. The only way to stop Pauley from pursuing a feature role in the horror show that this investigation unveiled is to incarcerate him.”

Pauley’s attorney did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment. The court docket did not include any sentencing memorandum from the defense.

Screenshot of an online listing for human remains, posted more than two years after Jeremy Pauley was first arrested for his involvement in the human remains trade. (Source Middle District of Pennsylvania U.S. Attorney’s Office)

Pauley purchased at least two stillborn fetuses from Candace Chapman Scott, a mortuary worker in Arkansas. The remains were supposed to be cremated and returned to their families. Instead, Chapman Scott took them home and mailed them to Pauley, who then preserved them.

In Facebook messages with her, included in court filings, Pauley called fetal remains “my favorite things in the world.”

“I find them so serene and peaceful,” he wrote. “In what little time they had, they had peace. Which we all spend [our] lives after birth trying to find. They are beautiful to me.”

On Monday night, Pauley took to Facebook and posted a lengthy defense of himself and his work. He wrote that his legal team “proved that ‘my ongoing conduct’ of selling human remains is completely legal, that I never stole anything, that I had never been to a facility where body parts were stolen, that I never pursued the purchase of anything I knew was stolen.”

He noted that the 15 years prosecutors asked the judge for was among the highest recommended for any defendant.

“My sentence was handed down for the simple fact that, I continue to work in a field not understood by the masses, despite proving, and having the judge agree, that the buying, selling, and collecting of such items is legal,” he wrote.

He said he is discussing an appeal with his attorneys.

“I will not go quietly into the night,” he said.

When reached by WBUR, Pauley declined to comment further.

In a long Facebook post also published Monday after the sentencing, a user named Sophie Mae Vee — who appears to be Pauley’s fiancé and business partner Sophie Vietri  — defended him, saying that Pauley neve4r stole anything and had nothing to do with Lodge at Harvard.

“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,” she wrote.

“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,” she wrote, apparently referring to places that included morgues and hospital crematoriums.

She insisted it is not illegal to “sell, own, display, or conserve human remains … Should these laws ever change, there would be no hesitation in respecting it.”

There is no federal law prohibiting the trafficking of human remains. But it is illegal in some states, including Massachusetts. And in state court in Pennsylvania, Pauley already pleaded guilty to a charge of abuse of a corpse and was sentenced to two years probation.

Prosecutors noted in Pauley’s sentencing memo that many collectors insist their items are historical and legal.

“But with respect to fetal remains, internal organs, which Pauley and other remains traffickers refer to as ‘wet specimens’ or ‘wets,’ there are no identified legal means by which a private collector or seller can acquire those remains. These remains are invariably stolen,” they wrote.

In Arkansas, Chapman Scott was sentenced in January to 15 years in prison for her thefts. The mother of one of the stillborn babies told the court at Chapman Scott’s sentencing that she will be tortured by what happened to her son for the rest of her life.

“I have to think about not only my child being sent through the mail like an Amazon package, but who all touched him? Who all came in contact with him,” she said, according to court filings. “We had a beautiful memorial for him, and he wasn’t even there.”

Pauley never purchased directly from Harvard Medical School’s former morgue manager, Cedric Lodge. But prosecutors say two of Lodge’s customers, Katrina Maclean and Joshua Taylor, sold and traded directly with Pauley, and that Pauley knew where the body parts he was buying came from.

Maclean traded skin from Harvard with Pauley, who then tanned it for her, prosecutors say.

Maclean and Taylor have both pleaded guilty to interstate transport of stolen goods and are awaiting sentencing. Lodge was sentenced last week to eight years in prison by the same judge.