A popular TikTok creator has uncovered a strange connection between a recently arrested grave robber and a massive body-snatching scandal at Harvard Medical School. While the two cases seem separate at first, the creator suggests they are linked through a dark underground market for human remains. The man at the center of the new investigation is Jonathan Gerlach, who was caught with a horrifying collection of bones in Pennsylvania.
The link between Gerlach and the Harvard case reportedly goes through a man named Jeremy Pauley. Pauley was recently sent to prison for his role in buying and selling stolen body parts that came from the Harvard morgue. He used to run a museum for “oddities,” and the TikTok investigator claims that Gerlach was part of the same social circle. Specifically, Gerlach is said to be very close with Pauley’s former partner, acting almost like a big brother to her.
The investigation alleges that when Pauley and his partner had a falling out, she took some of the human remains from his collection. Gerlach supposedly helped her try to sell these items, which included things like a lion skull and even more grisly human remains. While it is not yet proven that these specific items came from Harvard, the fact that they were being traded within the same group of people has raised a lot of red flags for investigators.
Gerlach’s own legal troubles are already incredibly serious. When police raided his home and storage unit, they found more than 100 human skulls and several bodies that were still decomposing. Many of these remains were stolen from a historic cemetery near Philadelphia. He is now facing hundreds of criminal charges for breaking into vaults and stealing from the dead. Police are currently trying to figure out if he was selling these stolen bodies to the same buyers involved in the Harvard scandal.
The Harvard case itself was one of the most shocking news stories of the last few years. The manager of the school’s morgue was caught stealing parts from bodies that had been donated to science. Instead of cremating them, he sold them to collectors across the country. With the new details coming out about Gerlach, it seems the illegal trade of human remains in Pennsylvania might be much larger than anyone previously realized.
