East Bethel Man Sentenced For Trafficking In Stolen Human Remains
Tuesday, January 7, 2025, 6:30 A.M. ET. 2 Minute Read, By Art Fletcher: Englebrook Independent News,
SCRANTON, PA.- Just when you thought you had seen it all, a second man, a resident of Minnesota, became the second person to be sentenced on Friday in the Middle District of Pennsylvania for the cross-country trafficking of stolen human remains.
According to U.S. Attorney Gerard M. Karam, on Friday, January 3, 2025, Matthew Lampi, 50, of East Bethel, Minnesota, appeared in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania and was sentenced by Chief U.S. District Court Judge Matthew W. Brann to 15 months in federal prison for his previously entered guilty plea to Interstate Transport of Human Remains.
According To Charging Documents
According to charging documents filed with the District Court and statements made during his plea allocution, Lampi admitted that he purchased human remains, including the corpse of a stillborn baby boy, from Jeremy Pauley, a resident of the Middle District of Pennsylvania.
Pauley had purchased the stolen remains from Candace Chapman Scott, who stole the human remains from her employer, a Little Rock, Arkansas, mortuary and crematorium. Scott stole parts of cadavers she was supposed to have cremated, many of which were donated and were to be used for research and educational purposes by an area medical school, as well as the corpuses of two stillborn babies who were supposed to be cremated and the ashes returned to their families.
Scott sold the stolen remains to Pauley and shipped them to Pauley in the Middle District of Pennsylvania. Pauley then sold the human remains he purchased to other individuals, including Matthew Lampi. Lampi and Pauley bought and sold from each other over a period of time and exchanged over $100,000 in online payments.
Among the items Pauley sold and shipped to Lampi in Minnesota was the remains of a stillborn baby named Lux. Lux’s mother, who had engaged a funeral home in the Little Rock area to cremate her son’s remains, was given ashes that she believed were the ashes of her deceased son but were not. Scott stole the baby boy’s body and sold and shipped it to Pauley, who then sold and shipped the boy’s body to Lampi in Minnesota.
In addition to the term of imprisonment, Judge Brann ordered Lampi to pay Lux’s mother $1,700 in restitution and a $2,000 fine. Both Pauley and Chapman Scott await sentencing after entering guilty pleas to federal charges in the Middle District of Pennsylvania and Arkansas.
