A Pennsylvania man suspected of desecrating a historic cemetery in his state is facing hundreds of charges pertaining to grave robbery after authorities recently found more than 100 pieces of human remains in his possession, prompting one official to call the case “the most horrific thing”.
Jonathan Gerlach, 34, had human skulls, bones, mummified feet, headless torsos and other corpse parts – including in his car, home and storage locker – after his arrest on Tuesday, according to a sworn police statement reported by NBC News.
Among the remains was a skeleton with a cardiac pacemaker still attached, as the Philadelphia Inquirer noted.
Investigators on Thursday told news outlets that it was unclear what motive Gerlach had to allegedly stockpile the remains, some of which were said to be hundreds of years old.
“Very simply, detectives have recovered an awful lot of bones at this point, and we are still trying to piece together who they are, where they are from and how many we are looking at,” the Delaware county district attorney, Tanner Rouse, told news reporters. “And it’s going to be quite some time before we have a final answer.”
According to prosecutors, Gerlach evidently spent months forcing his way into at least 26 mausoleums and underground burial vaults at Mount Moriah cemetery in the Delaware county community of Yeadon to steal the remains in question.
Among those to have once been interred at Mount Moriah was Betsy Ross, the Philadelphia seamstress credited with sewing the first US flag, Rohan Hepkins, Yeadon’a mayor and a cemetery governing board member, said at a news briefing.
Gerlach became a suspect in the grave burglaries after police noticed his Toyota Rav4 repeatedly shown on license plate readers near the cemetery, which – as NBC noted – lacks a fence and boasts a number of easily accessible entrances. His cellphone records also established that Gerlach was in the cemetery’s vicinity around the time of the thefts, police said.
Yeadon police on Tuesday then spotted Gerlach leaving Mount Moriah with a crowbar and burlap sack, as the Inquirer reported. They arrested him near the Rav4, where in plain view “there were numerous bones and skulls in the back seat area”, said the probable cause affidavit that police filed after they took Gerlach into custody, according to the Pennsylvania news outlet WHP-TV.
Two children’s mummified remains, three skulls and several loose bones were inside the burlap sack, Yeadon police said. Gerlach allegedly told detectives he had used the crowbar that night to pry open a grave and steal the remains it contained. He was also accused of acknowledging that he had stolen at least 30 sets of human remains from the cemetery, including on previous occasions.
Police searched Gerlach’s home about 70 miles (113km) away in Ephrata, Pennsylvania, the next day. They said they discovered human remains in the basement, on shelves, hanging from the ceiling and separately at a storage locker.
“Detective walked into a horror movie come to life,” Rouse said. “This [was] an unbelievable scene.”
Rouse said investigators also recovered jewelry from Gerlach’s home, and they were trying to determine whether it had been taken with the remains to be sold.
As the Inquirer reported, Yeadon police chief Henry Giammarco remarked: “I can say this is probably the most horrific thing that I’ve seen” during his 30-year career in law enforcement.
Investigators booked Gerlach with nearly 575 offenses, including more than 100 counts of corpse abuse. His other alleged crimes include theft, burglary, intentional desecration of venerated objects, trespassing, criminal mischief, receiving stolen property and desecrating historic lots and burial places.
A judge ordered Gerlach held in lieu of $1m bail. He is tentatively scheduled to appear in court again on 20 January. No attorney for him was immediately listed.
Rouse said he deeply empathized with those who were seeking to learn whether Gerlach’s alleged grave robbery spree had disturbed their relatives’ remains.
“I grieve for those who are upset by this, who are going through it, who are trying to figure out if it is, in fact, their loved one or their child,” Rouse told reporters. “Because we found remains that we believe to be months-old infants – among those that he had collected.”
