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The Pennsylvania man suspected of stealing more than 100 pieces of human remains from a historic cemetery has allegedly admitted to selling some of them online – while the graveyard solicits donations to upgrade its security.
Jonathan Gerlach’s purported admission, along with the most complete account yet of how he caught the attention of law enforcement, are contained in search warrants obtained by authorities investigating a case one government official called “a horror movie come to life”.
Detectives said they were already investigating reports of cemetery burglaries when police evidently received a tip that was submitted online and urged them to look into whether Gerlach was connected to one mausoleum robbery in particular. As the Pennsylvania news outlet WHP-TV reported in the Baltimore Sun, the tipster described knowing someone who had been in Gerlach’s home and had spotted a “partially decomposed corpse” hanging in the basement.
The tipster further alleged that Gerlach, 34, had claimed to have been “in Chicago selling a human skull” at one point. A social media account of his purportedly followed other users devoted to “skeleton collecting and sales”, and the tipster directed investigators’ attention to it, authorities alleged.
While combing through his social media, detectives noted how someone in a so-called human bones and skull selling group thanked Gerlach for what was described as a human skin bag. Detectives furthermore said they found Gerlach on a money payment app, and his profile picture showed someone holding what appeared to be a human skull.
Police have said they eventually linked Gerlach to grave burglaries at Mount Moriah cemetery in the Philadelphia suburb of Yeadon in particular after they noticed his Toyota Rav4 repeatedly showing up on license plate readers nearby. His cellphone records also established that Gerlach was in the vicinity of the cemetery around the time of the burglaries in mausoleums and underground burial vaults there.
Yeadon police alleged that they saw Gerlach leaving Mount Moriah with a crowbar and burlap sack on 6 January. They arrested him near the car, where bones and skulls were visible in the backseat area, according to the police statements cited by WHP-TV.
The burlap sack, meanwhile, allegedly contained two children’s mummified remains, three skulls and several loose bones, Yeadon police said. Gerlach allegedly acknowledged “that he sold some remains online but that the vast majority of them were in the basement” of his home in Ephrata, Pennsylvania, about 70 miles away, said the search warrant cited by WHP-TV.
Police searched Gerlach’s Ephrata home the next day. Officers said they discovered human remains in the basement, on shelves, hanging from the ceiling and at a storage locker.
The local district attorney Tanner Rouse said investigators had essentially “walked into a horror movie come to life”. “This,” he remarked, “[was] an unbelievable scene.”
Officers subsequently booked Gerlach with nearly 575 alleged crimes – at least to start, including more than 100 counts of corpse abuse. He also faces charges of theft, burglary, intentional desecration of venerated objects, trespassing, criminal mischief, receiving stolen property, and desecrating historic lots as well as burial places.
Gerlach remained in custody Tuesday in lieu of $1m bail at the jail in Delaware county, Pennsylvania, which encompasses Yeadon. He was tentatively scheduled to appear at a preliminary hearing on 20 January.
Mount Moriah was established in 1855. Among those who were once interred there was Betsy Ross, the Philadelphia seamstress credited with sewing the first US flag.
Many of the cemetery’s 150,000 grave sites are said to have remains dating back to the US’s war of independence from the UK, which began in 1775.
Despite that historical background, the cemetery endured years of neglect. It lacked a security fence at the time of the burglaries attributed to Gerlach, and it also has a number of easily accessible entrances.
Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery, a non-profit which has striven to maintain the graveyard as much as possible, has said it hopes to install new surveillance cameras, initiate patrols of the grounds, and erect a security fence in the aftermath of Gerlach’s arrest. The group has also asked the public to consider making tax-deductible donations to the cemetery to support the planned upgrades, as the Philadelphia news outlet WTXF reported.
