Harvard to pay $53m over theft and sale of human remains from medical school

Cedric Lodge, 58, sentenced in December to eight years in prison for stealing and selling body parts in national scheme

Harvard University has agreed to pay a $53m settlement to resolve civil lawsuits stemming from the illegal theft and sale of human remains that had been donated to its medical school for scientific research.

A former Harvard medical school morgue manager, Cedric Lodge, 58, was sentenced in December last year to eight years in prison after he had pleaded guilty in May to stealing and selling human body parts in a nationwide scheme. Prosecutors said this had involved the theft and sale of organs, skin, brains and dissected heads from cadavers donated to Harvard from 2018 through at least March 2020.