An Arkansas woman was indicted over charges of selling body parts from medical school corpses for nearly $11,000 to a Pennsylvania man she met on social media.
Candace Chapman Scott, 36, a former mortuary worker, is accused of selling 20 boxes of body parts to a man she met through a Facebook group about “oddities,” according to the April 5 indictment unsealed Friday in federal court in Little Rock, the New York Post reports.
Scott pleaded not guilty to 12 counts, including conspiracy to commit mail fraud, mail fraud, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit interstate transportation of stolen property and interstate transportation of stolen property. (RELATED: Former Funeral Directors Sentenced For Selling Body Parts)
Though the alleged buyer was not named in the indictment, separate state charges identified him as Jeremy Lee Pauley. The indictment alleges Scott first contacted Pauley through Facebook in October 2021. The indictment stipulates that over the next nine months Scott sold Pauley fetuses, brains, hearts, lungs, genitalia, large pieces of skin and other body parts. She allegedly offered Pauley a discounted fetus because it was “not in great shape,” the indictment claims.
“I think that the facts … underlying the indictment and in the indictment are uniquely egregious and objectionable, and we believe there is going to be some significant public outcry as a result of this,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Amanda Jegley said. Scott remains in jail awaiting a hearing Tuesday on if she will be released on bail.
According to the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, Scott worked at Arkansas Central Mortuary Services, a funeral home. Part of her job included transporting, cremating and embalming remains. The medical school sent remains of donated cadavers that medical students had used to examine to the mortuary to be cremated.
The FBI has not revealed whether any remains have been identified to school officials, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences spokeswoman Leslie Taylor told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. She said embalming damages DNA, making identification extremely difficult.
The medical school still partners with Arkansas Central Mortuary Services, Taylor said, according to the New York Post.
There are many Facebook groups involving “oddities,” namely buying and selling items of peculiar interest which arouse curiosity. Most are private and can have a reach of thousands of members.