Body Harvesting Story Goes Into Overdrive with Celebrity Victim

Jen Chung

Published Dec 22, 2005

Modified Mar 7, 2008

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Jen Chung

Published Dec 22, 2005

Modified Mar 7, 2008

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For the love of public broadcasting (the BBC!): The really gross story of the Brooklyn mortician who sold body parts from corpses has taken an even more tabloid spin: It turns out that the famed broadcaster Alistair Cooke's body was handled by the same perps, and could have been harvested for parts, through a Spanish Harlem mortuary. What's more, Cooke was 95 years old - and he was pretty sick when he died of cancer (the Daily News points out that the FDA prohibits the use of cancerous bones and organs in, well, probably anything)! We can't imagine what anyone would want to do with 95 year old organs or tissue, but then again, we're not sickos who would be trafficking in these body parts. And what's really sick? When bones were harvested from bodies, PVC pipe was used to replace them. Ew. If Cooke's body really were mishandled, we expect Brits to launch a full scale attack on the American funeral system, tout de suite.