A Pennsylvania man was charged with abuse of a corpse, receiving
stolen property, and several other charges after local police claimed he allegedly misused Facebook Marketplace to purchase stolen human remains with plans to resell them.
The East Pennsboro Township Police arrested and charged 40-year-old Jeremy Lee Pauley from Enola, Pennsylvania. According to the affidavit, Pauley was arrested on July 22 and had his first court appearance this past Thursday. The woman from Arkansas has no charges as of this moment.
Police later received a tip of Pauley allegedly having newer human remains in his house, then returned to his residence, discovering three five-gallon buckets filled with assorted body parts. According to the affidavit, the police found the bodies of children and adults. Federal and state law enforcement agents intercepted the packages addressed to Pauley from the Arkansas woman before he was able to receive them.
Pauley identifies himself as a collector of oddities, including human body parts claiming he legally obtained the human remains initially found the older human remains, including entire skeletons concluding the remains are legal, according to the affidavit.
According to the affidavit, the packages sent from the Arkansas Woman contained body parts. The investigators claim he had possible plans to resell them. Investigators alleged Pauley attempted to arrange and pay the Arkansas woman $4,000 for the human remains through Facebook Messenger.
Leslie Taylor, a spokeswoman for the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) in Little Rock, confirmed the body was at the UAMS facility and a mortuary for cremation. Taylor said the remains were at Arkansas Central Mortuary Services in Little Rock, where they allegedly got stolen by a female mortuary employee and sold and are currently under an open federal investigation.
Sean McCormack, a district attorney for Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, was shocked by what he saw with this case, stating he thought he saw everything in his career, and then this case came around.
“I think I’ve seen it all, and then something like this comes around,” said Sean McCormack, district attorney for Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, where Pauley received charges.
“The question we had to answer was, Is the sale of body parts or bones and remains illegal … or legal? Some of it, to our surprise, was legal. And as the investigation went on, it became clear there was illegal activity going on as well.”
Facebook prohibits using the platform to buy/sell body parts, as stated in their policy.
