Weird things morgue attendants do:

Death across many cultures is among the most dreaded occurrence. The reason being the unanswered questions death leaves people with. Many people are afraid of death to such an extent you would think it is a contagious disease. The moment the spirit leaves the body, people view the lifeless body as a monster. As a result, people transfer it to the Morgue to await burial or cremation; it’s left in the care of a morgue attendant. Morgue attendants are charged with the responsibility of preserving the body to ensure human dignity is not lost until the body has been disposed off. To be a morgue attendant, you need to have some guts, a hard stomach but did you know some morgue attendants not only do they undertake some weird things in the morgue but also do weird and odd things with the corpses: Sex with corpses: There have been reported cases people pressing charges against morgue attendants whom in their lives have disturbed the peace of a corpse by having sex with them. A good example was in the case of Kenneth Douglas a 60 year old American who was charged in an Ohio court for having sex with a girl who had been murdered and her body had badly decayed in the early 1990. The man confessed to have slept with at least 100 corpses although under the influence of alcohol and drugs. He could not have been found out had the semen DNA found in the dead girl not matched his. Extracting and selling corpse organs: Illegal trade in human organs has been ongoing throughout the world especially by morgue attendants who collude with organ brokers to remove and sell specific body organs. These cases are more prevalent in poor countries especially in Africa due to poor infrastructure. Majority of hospitals in Africa, for example a National Hospital in Kenya is yet to adopt technologies used in identifying unclaimed bodies. As a result, this creates room for illicit trade in human body organs to thrive. There is need to equip hospitals with biometric facilities to help in identification process. Mortuary attendants in these places have admitted transferring body organs or even swapping blood samples in order to help family of a person who died under alcohol influence; the swap blood samples with that of people who were not drunk when they died. Similar cases have been reported in the US where organs and brain parts of an infant were sold by a morgue assistant without the consent of the family in California. Stealing from the dead: Morgue attendants have also been accused and charged for stealing gold watches, clothes and shoes from dead people. Instead of undressing the corpse and keep all the items collected together for the families to pick, some opt to make these corpse belongings theirs. A good example was reported in Zambia where a nurse was jailed after the cops testified how they demolished the nurse’s pit latrine to recover a corpse National ID and a National Pension Scheme Card. In the US, a similar case was reported of a morgue attendant who was charged for stealing from a dead man, selling his credit cards and forging his signature to loot some $ 300,000 from him. Eating in the morgue: After working for several years, it appears mortuary attendants lose their sense of humanity, smell and taste. It is not unusual to see a morgue attendant taking a snack or drinking tea next to a dead smelling body without even blinking an eye.