Introducing... Strangely

Summary

Project Mind Control: Introducing… Strangely

Podcast: Project Mind Control / Always True Crime
Episode: Introducing... Strangely
Date: April 24, 2026

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Episode Overview

This crossover segment is an introduction to "Strangely," a podcast delving into bizarre real-life crime and fringe oddities. The featured case explores a modern grave-robbing scandal in Pennsylvania, revealing a thriving underground market for human remains, the law’s gray areas, and humanity’s enduring fascination with the macabre. Hosted by journalists Poppy Damon and Luke Jones, the episode blends investigative reporting, cultural history, and devilish humor.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Mount Moriah Cemetery Mystery

Time: [03:27]–[07:59]

• Setting: Mount Moriah Cemetery, a sprawling, historic burial ground in Philadelphia and Yadin, Pennsylvania.
• Discovery: In November, volunteers and police discover several mausoleums have been violently broken into—a step above vandalism, with actual desecration and stolen remains.
  • “It wasn't just wear and tear. These were fully desecrated graves.” (Poppy Damon, [04:13])
• Theories: Is it animals, kids, or actual grave robbers? Rumors swirl while local families are distressed.

2. The Tipoff and the Suspect

Time: [05:03]–[06:14]

• Break in the Case: Police receive a tip: a man named John Gerlach may be involved.
  • Tipster Report: “He had seen a partially decomposed corpse hanging in the basement of this gentleman’s home.” ([05:19])
• Social Media Evidence: Gerlach posts openly about collecting bones, skeletons, and oddities, running a “bone museum.”
  • “None of these things in the state of Pennsylvania are illegal...but it is illegal to break into graves.” (Luke Jones, [06:14])

3. The Law, the Loot, and the Market for Human Remains

Time: [07:16]–[10:00]

• Facebook Groups: Investigators find Gerlach is active in “human bones and skull selling” groups where transactions are open and disturbingly casual.
• Social Media as Evidence: “Social media is horrible, isn’t it?...Is this what they’re getting up to on [Facebook], is my question.” (Male Co-Host, [08:36])
• Murderabilia Market: Explores the broader world of collecting crime artifacts—hair, paintings, bones.
  • “There’s a big market for serial killers...It’s ethically really ambiguous.” (Poppy Damon, [08:47])
• Legal Notes: “Criminals can’t benefit from their crimes...They’re called Son of Sam laws because...” (Luke Jones, [09:08])

4. The Arrest & Aftermath

Time: [10:03]–[13:20]

• Gerlach Caught Red-Handed: Police tail Gerlach and catch him leaving the cemetery with a crowbar and a burlap sack containing mummified children’s remains.
  • “There’s mummified children’s remains, skulls and bones.” (Luke Jones, [10:51])
• Basement Horrors: Search of his home reveals “a horror movie come to life”—over 100 human bones, skeletons on shelves, corpses hanging, even medical devices still in remains.
  • “Shelves covered in skeletal remains, corpses hanging from the ceiling...” (Luke Jones, [11:31])
• Local Reaction: Families are horrified, volunteers rally to protect graves, and security is ramped up.

5. The Subculture and Macabre Trade

Time: [13:33]–[16:20]

• Gerlach’s Background: Part of heavy metal/oddities communities; friends shocked by the scale of his crimes.
• Buyers & Ethics: Buyers may also face legal consequences; show discusses humanity’s fascination with macabre artifacts.
  • “Humans love strange, macabre objects...there’s a long history of that.” (Luke Jones, [14:37])
• Price of Remains:
  • “Take a guess, how much a full skeleton can go for...up to $7,000.” ([15:10]–[15:28])

6. Historical Context and the Evolution of Grave Robbing

Time: [15:33]–[16:20]

• Reference to History: Grave robbing once fed medical cadaver demand—parallels with modern internet-fueled trade.

7. The Collector’s Mindset

Time: [16:25]–[18:54]

• Collectors and True Crime:
  • “There was a car owned by a serial killer...he just liked to sit in it and get a creepy feeling.” (Poppy Damon, [18:05])
• Societal Reflection: Provocative question—where’s the line between consuming true crime and engaging in macabre collection?
  • “What’s the difference between watching a true crime documentary and wanting to buy the car where someone’s murdered?” (Luke Jones, [18:40])

8. Current Status of the Case

Time: [19:48]–[21:18]

• Charges: Gerlach jailed on $1 million bail, faces 574 criminal counts, including abuse of corpse, theft, desecration.
  • “It’s actually 574 criminal counts...” (Luke Jones, [20:12])
• Loose Ends: Crime scene evidence includes stray DNA (energy drinks, cigarette butts) and relies on volunteer-run cemeteries’ vulnerability.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Droll Humor on Discovery:
  • “What did he have the sack over his shoulder and was he sort of comedy creeping?” (Male Co-Host, [10:40])
• On the Scene in Gerlach’s Basement:
  • “Described the scene as a horror movie come to life. There were shelves covered in skeletal remains, corpses hanging from the ceiling...” (Luke Jones, [11:31])
• Market Realities:
  • “You can go for up to $7,000.” (Luke Jones, [15:28])
  • “Which actually seems really low, doesn’t it, for a human corpse.” (Male Co-Host, [15:33])
• Ethical Reflections:
  • “What’s the difference between watching a true crime documentary and wanting to buy the car where someone's murdered?” (Luke Jones, [18:40])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Introduction to Case & Setting: [03:27]–[04:13]
• The Tip and Social Media Trail: [05:03]–[06:14]
• Grave-Robbing Arrest: [10:03]–[11:50]
• Collector Culture, Market Value: [13:33]–[16:20]
• Deep Dive: Ethics, History, and Modern Parallels: [16:25]–[18:54]
• Case Status & Legal Aftermath: [19:48]–[21:18]

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Tone & Style

The conversation is darkly humorous, direct, and sometimes mordant—balancing respect for victims with fascination for the bizarre. Damon and Jones tease out both horror and absurdity, making the subject accessible while never losing sight of its gravity.

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Summary

“Introducing...Strangely” uncovers how old-world grave robbing persists in the digital age: a Pennsylvania man exploits security lapses at historic cemeteries, trafficking in human remains through open online sales—his arrest exposing a flourishing, ethically fraught subculture. The episode probes legal blind spots, true crime fascination, and the long shadow cast by humanity’s curious relationship to death, concluding with an open question: Where is the line between morbid curiosity and complicity?

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Transcript

[True Crime Narrator]

Your True Crime episode will start in just a moment. This show is part of the Always True Crime network of podcasts, and there's loads of investigative series to get stuck into, like Codename Badger that tells the story of a family whose lives changed forever when a stranger arrived on their doorstep claiming that what they knew about their late husband and father was a lie. It's a tale of espionage and deception spanning seven decades. Or the mystic in the Mayor 10 takes you to a small French coastal town that plunged into chaos when the world discovers what happens when political power and supernatural forces collide. Set in an idyllic holiday destination, this case shatters the serenity of a small town. Search for Always True Crime and get your next true crime series lined up to play next.

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[True Crime Narrator]

your next true crime podcast is waiting for you after Project Mind Control. Listen to Strangely, the show that Uncovers the world's most bizarre stories, from true crime to conspiracy theories and all the wonderfully weird in between. Journalist Luke Jones, who you'll know from the Pitcairn trials, and true crime podcast legend Poppy Damon joined forces to explore the overlooked oddities that deserve a deep dive. From mysterious grave tampering in Pennsylvania in the USA to a bionic surgeon in Cornwall in the uk These cases need to be heard, to be believed. Listen to this story from Strangely, that just gets weirder and weirder.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

You're big into cemeteries, you've pitched a few. Cemetery.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

It's true, it's true. I was, there's a, there was a London vampire story that was in a cemetery. A lot of my podcasts start off at a cemetery for various reasons because often if the person's dead, it's a

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

good place to go and begin.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So we're going to start at a cemetery on a winter's night.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

It's called Mount Moriah Cemetery, like Mariah Carey, but not spelled that way. Moriah.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Okay, before you ask, I know where you're going with that, Luke.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Oh, I was going to ask.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And it's, it's in Philadelphia and also

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

spans into a place called Yadin in Pennsylvania.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And it's got, so it's a big cemetery and it's got, you know, family plots, Revolutionary War soldiers. It's a kind of really amazing cemetery

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

with like big mausoleums and kind of old tombstones.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And this story takes place as recently as November last year when volunteers and police started to notice what appeared to

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

be break ins to some of the vaults.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

It wasn't just wear and tear. These were fully desecrated graves. And you know, the volunteers like to maintain the sites.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

They thought this was very mysterious.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And of course rumors start to circulate

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

because grave robbers have a kind of

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

mythical folklore kind of tale. But they almost couldn't believe it. Was it animals, was it kids just messing around? But they thought that.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

And this isn't somebody with a shovel trying to dig up a bit of earth and exhume a grave. These are sort of those big stone.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Exactly.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Mausoleum type things. And what a sort of big stone doors open.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

Yeah.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Rocks moved so that person been able to enter. And of course you wouldn't know what was in there. So you don't know exactly what had

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

been taken as well.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

But obviously very painful for families. You know, they want to go and

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

visit their loved ones and these kind of break ins are happening.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And then there's a tip, as there

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

often is, that comes into the Police.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And it was from someone who believed that a man named John Gerlach may

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

be behind these break ins.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And the tipster had said that he

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

had seen a partially decomposed corpse hanging in the basement of this gentleman's home.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Hang on, this is what a great tip. Oh, there's this mystery about all of these, you know, half open mausoleums in this thing. Oh, I know who it is. Oh, and also I've seen in his basement. Okay, maybe. Okay.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

It's true, as tips go, it's pretty good. And then even more on the nose, really, as tips go. They said you should also check out

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

this man's social media. This is someone who's not being secretive about it.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

The police have a look on his

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

Instagram account of this man Gerlach and

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

they say that they see posts about taxidermy skeleton collecting oddities and allusions to a bone museum. Now you should know up front that none of these things in the state of Pennsylvania are illegal. It's not illegal to, for example, have

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

human remains, but it is illegal to break into graves.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

That's important.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Hang on. So if I here in London had, I mean, I don't even know why you'd have human remains, but if I had a relative's leg as a keepsake after they died and I couldn't really keep that, could I?

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Because I don't know the law in England. I just.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Look, preventing the lawful bear. If you're preventing the lawful burial of. Yes, there must be licenses.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

I think as long as you, all the other laws are met, it's okay. So I think if you're right, if it was like a family plot and then you ended up, you know, in Greece, for example, there's not enough grave

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

sites, so they do actually clear them up and people do kind of keep the, the remnants.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So there's different rules in different places. But here they know that this, you know, they want to connect it to the break ins.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

Is this this man who's just like got some weird taxidermy or is this someone who's breaking and entering and the

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

taxidermy was of animals?

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Doesn't say. I think it was a sort of. It was, it was his social media was in order for people to purchase things. So I think there was some.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

It wasn't particularly clear what he was

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

maybe alluding to though.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

They will come back to the socials in due course.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So they also hear, they also notice that there's a suspect leaving a hardware

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

store in East Earl Township, Pennsylvania and

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

he's where this Is really funny because true crime followers will know that there's

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

always this moment in the documentary where they find them shopping at a hardware store.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And what he was purchasing was headlamp.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

What are you doing with all that rope? Literally.

[True Crime Narrator]

De.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

Rechargeable glow stick gloves and tools commonly used in burglaries.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Now, actually, I said he was leaving the shop, they'd been stolen, and they.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

They thought that was rather mysterious as well, and they thought that he was behind that robbery.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

But you think if you're gonna, you know, use those tools, you think you just purchase them. Although then that would be more directly linked to him.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

So maybe it was smart to steal them because you wouldn't have the credit card bill that says big shovel.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Yeah.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And then they look the downfall of

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

many a killer, literally.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Then they look a little bit deeper, and they see that he is a member of a human bones and skull selling group on Facebook. And they see that another. Another member of that group said, thanks, Jonathan. Really enjoyed that item you sold me. So it's starting to look really suspicious.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Social media is horrible, isn't it? As. As millennials have ceded Facebook to older boomer generations. Is this what they're getting up to on there, is my question.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And you know what the funny thing is? When I made my first series, Murderabilia, it was about people who collected true crime objects. And there's a big market for serial killers. Hair paintings drawn by serial killers in prison. And it's ethically really ambiguous. Right, because if you're putting money in

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

their commissary, you are essentially purchasing it.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Though many places have laws that say

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

criminals can't benefit from their crimes.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

They're called Son of Sam laws because

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

the Son of Sam at one point was going to have a biopic and get quite a lot of money. And these laws came in to say, no, you can't be, you know, using your fame to. To profit, because it would really incentivize people to be major serial killers.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So there's these groups you should say, have, you know, 5,000 members.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

Some of them. You know, these are really popular underground worlds. That. That John Garlic was a. I said garlic. I mean, garlic, obviously, which you might

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

need if you're traipsing around a cemetery at night. That. A garlic wooden steak, all this.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So he also had a cash app

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

account which showed a photo of a person holding what appeared to be a human skull.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And then they further looked at his vehicle, and they could see that he

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

had driven in some of the locations where burglaries you know, had taken place in the cemetery.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So it's all not looking very good. And the police are doing all this

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

work quietly at the end of last year and in early January, they make an arrest this year, this year.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So just only a few weeks ago.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

I don't know why, I don't know why it's worse for being sort of

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

more recent, but it's true, it is more disturbing. And so they confront this suspect, John Gerlach. They had all these evidence against him.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

He's 34 years old, he's from Pennsylvania,

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

and in fact they've been following him. And this is really beggar's belief, but they catch him leaving a cemetery, the cemetery with a crowbar and a burlap sack. The burlap sack really gets me.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

What did he have the sack over his shoulder and was he sort of comedy creeping?

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

That's how I pictured it, doing the little like grave. And then this is really awful. So then they look inside the burlap

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

sack and there's mummified children's remains, skulls and bones.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Now, now I feel bad about the trait.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

I know, but let's hope these are sort of. I think they're long dead graves that

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

he's sort of interested in, for them

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

to be mummified and all of that.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

They often kind of historical bones and things.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

But he pretty quickly allegedly says to the police, look, I do mostly sell

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

these online, but the vast majority of them are in my basement and in my storage unit.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And so officers get a search warrant

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

and they go to his basement.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And one of the officers said, described

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

the scene as a horror movie come to life. There were shelves covered in skeletal remains, corpses hanging from the ceiling, as that witness had described, and over 100 human bones and skulls in various states of preservation. In fact, this detail really haunted me.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

There were even like pacemakers and other

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

medical devices that you could see within the bodies.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Oh, so it's like the worst episode

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

ever of Storage Hunters, you know, where they sort of all bid on an unclaimed storage unit. Imagine opening that and thinking sort of gold. And then it's.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

It's true. For those who've not been blessed enough to watch Storage Hunters, it's people who buy blindly from storage units. And usually there's like, you know, maybe some nice paintings or some pottery collection.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

You're right. If it was, it would be really the horror movie version if you landed with a bunch of decomposing bodies.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

But actually, sorry, but. But the lion's share of it, you were saying, was in his basement, not in his store.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Yes, exactly. So it's, it's a mixture of the two. He needed space, clearly for so many items, but what he was actually charged

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

with, because, you know, as I say, possessing them isn't necessarily legal, but he

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

was charged with burglary, corpse abuse, theft

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

of federated objects, desecration and a few others.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And of course all the local media has been kind of talking to the family members essentially, you know, they've been

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

giving statements saying that they're absolutely horrified that, you know, you want your loved ones to be laid to rest.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Extra volunteer groups have sort of cropped

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

up to protect the area from now on.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And the hurt caused by to family

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

members obviously cannot be underestimated when these are very like sacred places where people say goodbye.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So they. We've also seen that they've like really

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

enhanced security, so they've put cameras in. There's like, you know, a real effort

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

now to make sure this doesn't happen because as it turns out, John Gerlach

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

is part of this much wider community and they worry that he is just one of many.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And I was really interested in who

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

this man actually was and some of

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

the local press has spoken to some

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

of his friends and you may or may not be surprised to know that he's slightly in the heavy metal community.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And a former sort of friend and bandmate of his said, you know, he.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

He certainly had an interest in oddities,

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

but that they'd never heard him talking

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

about doing something like this.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

There's big questions over whether the people purchasing them are going to fake, face

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

legal consequences because in, in, in a

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

way they're sort of inviting the crime to take place. Because also, what is.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

It's. It's hard to decide what is worse is it. I mean, I guess it is the person who's going around desecrating these graves and stealing remains, but then also the weirdo who buys it online to do what with? Have it on a shelf, have it as some sort of creepy ornament.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

I think that. And I think again, like humans love strange, macabre objects like that.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

There's a long history of that. I mean, when they used to be

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

public hangings, people would go with handkerchiefs

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

and dip them in the blood and

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

keep them, or as I say, people

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

keeping locks of hair of criminals, skulls

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

of criminals, even famous crimes that take place.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

People want to preserve a bit of that history.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So I think it does have a real legacy with that. And I think that there is the kind of satanic heavy metal sometimes Overlap

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

in this world, in this. In this space.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And would you like to take a

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

guess how much a full skeleton can go for on one of these Facebook websites?

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Great question. Full skeleton with display box.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

No display box.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Is it, what, like a couple thousand dollars?

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

You can go for up to $7,000.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So these.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Which actually seems really low, doesn't it,

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

for a human corpse. Yeah, but it. But on the other hand, you think like, who's got seven grand just for this? You know, when you could get a

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

really good staged one. They want the real thing, the idea of living with the dead as a kind of ghoulish thing.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So, yeah, that is a little bit about the community. And also we should say that grave robbing does have this kind of long legacy. There was a. There's a famous tale where grave robbing

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

happened because cadavers used for medical experiments

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

suddenly had a great value in London. There was all the kind of public anatomy exams and things, and there were

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

some famous grave robbers involved in that.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

But, you know, in this instance, it is really just for the kind of online trade. Whether more laws will be brought in

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

to kind of stop people grave robbing or to prevent this online sale is yet to be seen.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

As you mentioned, you've done quite a bit looking at murderabilia. What was the sort of strangest bit that you found was the strangest item that someone had bought or sold or kept.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

I have to say, I get the commission of paintings. You know, there's Charles Manson music and there's John Wayne. Gacy famously drew these kind of clowns

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

and he was a clown. And they're kind of amazing pieces of art.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Those I kind of can.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

Can understand.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

I think for me, hair and toenail clippings and things like that I find harder to connect with because that sort

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

of gross from any one.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

But again, it's. It's almost like putting an animal head

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

on the wall, isn't it? It's like a physical piece of them

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

that you're holding, like pure evil.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

If you believe that in evil, you're kind of keeping a piece of that in a. In a box.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Yeah, but then I can sort of see then other end of the spectrum. You have, of course, you know, in some churches there will be the sacred remains of some saint. It might be their whole body, it might be a part of their body, but actually of someone grim or unknown to you, but bought off the Internet. Go out on a limb and say, that's strange. Have you ever been. I mean, obviously you reported on this kind of thing. But have you ever seen or been near any of this stuff or been in any kind of gruesome.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Yes. We went to meet lots of collectors and they want. The thing that was really creepy, actually, was there was a car owned by

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

a serial killer in which he'd picked up sex workers and murdered them in that vehicle.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And this gentleman called Paul that we spoke to had it in his garage, and he said he just liked to

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

sit in it and get a creepy feeling while he sat, where many people had lost their lives.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And that was quite disturbing because it's quite a large piece, you know, a large item. And, you know, I mean, I suppose you can go to the. What are they called, the catacombs in Paris and other places where you're kind

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

of lined with skulls.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

So I guess part of the series and maybe part of my interest that was drawn to this story is like, what is it that. You know, what. What's the. We kind of ask the question a bit provocatively, which is like, what's the

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

difference between watching a true crime documentary and wanting to buy the car where someone's murdered? You're ultimately still consuming the true crime genre, you know, and putting money towards that industry. Or the industrial complex of true crime.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

True crime industrial complex of which we would like. Please subscribe. I'm far too. Yeah, like.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

And subscribe.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

I'm far too squeamish for all that kind of stuff. I've been to one autopsy, really, but it was of a pop. It was of a poor poise.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

I thought you were gonna say of a pauper. And I was like, oh, my God, Luke, we can't have this on the Internet.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Poor poise, it was. I was at London Zoo doing something and they do. How did we get here? They do autopsies on every single animal that dies at the London Zoo to investigate how it dies. It could be a fly, it could be a giraffe. They cut that thing open and have a look. And this one was a porpoise.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

Wow.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

And, yeah, it was, like, on this table, open, and the guy was there, like, stringing all its insides out, being. Look at this here. You can tell from this that I was like, in the corner.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

Oh, my goodness.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Wouldn't recommend.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

Oh, my goodness.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

Not a good day at the office for me, I'd say. So before we finish, just back to your man Gerlach. What is. What is happening with him now? This is quite recent, so it's not been in court yet. He's still just facing.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Exactly. So he's being held in George W. Hill Correctional Facility on a million dollar bail.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 2]

I thought you said George W. Bush Correctional Facility.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

Then he faces, I mean, I obviously listed some of the main charges, but

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

it's actually 574 criminal counts.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And that's, you know, as I mentioned,

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

100 counts of abuse of a corpse, theft by unlawful taking, 100 counts receiving stolen property, 100 counts desecration of venerated objects, 26 counts.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

There is one other little tidbit detail as part of the police investigation.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

More is eking out. You know, there's this getting caught stealing

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

from the hardware store, allegedly. There's the tipster who said, you know,

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

I've seen some corpses in this guy's basement. There's his socials.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

There was also the desecration referred to

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

volunteers had seen things like he'd left energy drinks and cigarette butts. And so presumably they'll use DNA to link him to that. But it's sloppy criminal work, I should say.

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

And one important factor is like this,

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

this burial ground is, is quite historic

[Investigative Journalist (likely Poppy Damon)]

and is really run by volunteers. So I think presumably a criminal might have thought they could try their luck because it's really no longer a kind

[Investigative Journalist (likely Luke Jones)]

of active functioning burial site. But it wasn't to be. And good police work and some good tips meant that they caught him. And we'll have to see what happens at trial.

[True Crime Narrator]

Just search strangely wherever you get your podcast and line up your next listen.

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[Unidentified Male Speaker 1]

No the Devil wears Prada too he's the movie event 20 Years in the

[Unidentified Female Speaker 1]

honestly can't with the secrets anymore so I think we just. We should tell her.

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[Unidentified Male Speaker 1]

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[Unidentified Female Speaker 1]

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Oh. Cause we're a team now. That's a nice story.

[Unidentified Male Speaker 1]

The Devil wears Prada too Lady PG13 may be inappropriate for children under 13. In theaters Friday.

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[True Crime Narrator]

Want more? True Crime this podcast and loads more are part of the Always True Crime network. It's packed with box sets to binge and twisted tales you won't find anywhere else. Find your next podcast obsession at Always truecrime. Com.