Jonathan Gerlach was arrested after police made the horrifying discovery at his home earlier this year. Lawmakers have dubbed the case a “horror movie come to life”
A man has been hit with nearly 500 new charges after hundreds of skulls and other human remains were found in his home. Jonathan Gerlach has been caught in a ‘grave robber’ investigation after police made the horrifying discovery earlier this year.
Gerlach appeared in Delaware County court on Friday (April 17) in Pennsylvania, USA, and waived his right to a preliminary hearing.
This means that Gerlach is not challenging the prosecution’s evidence at that early hearing stage. While two charges were dropped, prosecutors have brought fresh burglary charges linked to cemetery thefts in two other nearby counties.
He is now facing almost 500 new charges, including abuse of a corpse, desecration of monuments and burglary. Gerlach was arrested in January, with Delaware County District Attorney Tanner Rouse describing the case as a “horror movie come to life”.
Officers first came across Gerlach at Mount Moriah Cemetery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and said they could see “numerous bones and skulls in plain view in the back seat” of his car, the Sun reported. After he was arrested, Gerlach reportedly told police he had taken about “30 sets of human remains” from the cemetery.
Police later said that they discovered more than 100 “full or partial sets of human and skeletal remains” inside his home. Investigators said some of the remains were more than 200 years old, and officers also found one body with a pacemaker still attached, according to the Sun.
Rouse said: “It is truly, in the most literal sense of the word, horrific. I grieve for those who are upset by this, who are going through this, who are trying to figure out if it is in fact one of their loved ones.”
Judy Prichard McCleary, whose family’s 1900 mausoleum was robbed, said, according to WTXF: “It just made me sick to my stomach to think anyone would want to do that.
“To be able to sell body parts on the internet just appalls me and I just think it should be stopped. I believe in the afterlife, I don’t believe my relatives were there, I believe their souls are in heaven, but I still think it’s disruptive and when you die and buried, you should be left alone.”
Investigators allege Gerlach was involved in an online “niche industry” trading in human bones, using social media to advertise and sell remains. They claim he used a Facebook group called “Human Bones and Skull Selling Group” to promote what was on offer.
Detectives say Gerlach was pictured on social media holding a skull and had reportedly been “slinging skulls” since at least June 2025. One tipster alleged he travelled as far as Chicago to hand-deliver a human skull to a customer.
Police say remains recovered from his home and a storage unit were in varying states, with some allegedly hanging from the ceiling, others pieced together, and many arranged on shelves like a “private corpse museum”.
Gerlach is now facing nearly 500 counts in total, with estimates ranging from 496 to 574. The alleged offences include more than 100 counts of abuse of a corpse, more than 100 counts linked to theft and receiving stolen property, and dozens of charges relating to desecration of burial places and monuments.
Investigators are still working to identify some of the remains so families can be notified. In response to the case, Pennsylvania lawmakers have proposed making the sale of stolen human remains a felony-level offence.
After his arrest, Gerlach faced multiple allegations, including 26 burglary counts, 100 counts of abusing a corpse, 26 counts of criminal trespass and 26 counts of intentionally desecrating a public monument. He was also accused of taking the human remains from the Prichard family mausoleum, built at Mount Moriah cemetery in the 1900s.
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