Bill addresses abuse of bodies

By Marc Kovac

The prosecutor says corpse abusers should get harsher penalties than shoplifters.

COLUMBUS — Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins has voiced his support for legislation increasing penalties against individuals who sexually abuse corpses.

Atty. Watkins sent letters to several state lawmakers on House Bill 29. Copies were distributed to members of the Ohio House’s criminal justice committee, which had a second hearing on the legislation Wednesday.

“Most everyone I know believes that if you engage in eviscerations, dismemberments and sexual assaults of deceased persons, the penalty should fit the crime, and a one-year maximum prison sentence just doesn’t fit,” Watkins wrote.

He added, “There does not appear to be a decrease in the incidents of depravity in these cases; rather, and unfortunately, there does appear to be an increase, especially with the abuse cases by the sexual psychopaths of the world.”

The legislation being considered by the Ohio House was offered by two Cincinnati-area lawmakers and prompted by the revelation that a former coroner’s office employee had sexual contact with dead people. That individual is in prison for one such crime, faces charges in two more and may have abused more than 100 corpses.

Necrophilia already is a crime under Ohio law, with offenders facing up to 12 months in prison and $2,500 in fines. The proposed new law would increase penalties to 1-5 years in prison and fines of up to $10,000.

In his letters to lawmakers, Watkins wrote that criminal penalties for such abuse have been softened too much through the years.

“You know, if [the morgue worker] would just attempt to do what he did to his victims in Cincinnati in the state of Wisconsin, he would face a maximum of 10 years in prison,” he wrote. “It would appear that Ohio’s law is out of kilter.”

He added, “It only makes good sense to up the current penalty for such outrageous criminal behavior. In my mind, a necrophiliac and shoplifter are not in the same category for purposes of ...[penalties] under criminal law.”