Pa. man waives hearing in numerous cases of stealing, hoarding human remains
Jonathan Gerlach, 34, was arrested initially for offenses at Delaware County cemetery, but there are more charges from around the state.
An Ephrata man accused of stealing and hoarding human remains from cemeteries in what Delaware County District Attorney Tanner Rouse previously described as “a horror movie come to life” on Friday waived his preliminary hearing.
Jonathan Gerlach, 34, of the 100 block of Washington Avenue, entered a conditional waiver of all 494 counts against him at a short hearing Friday before Magisterial District Judge W. Keith Williams. The hearing was held at the County Courthouse in Media due to a high level of media interest.
Assistant District Attorney Brian Denk at the outset of the hearing withdrew four counts of burglary previously charged for alleged thefts from Mount Moriah Cemetery and Arboretum in Yeadon because further investigation determined they weren’t burglarized.
Denk also added two counts of burglary to encompass conduct at cemeteries in Lancaster and Luzerne counties that Delaware County will be prosecuting.
Denk indicated the waiver was conditioned upon Gerlach entering into a nontrial disposition at a subsequent hearing.
The charges now include 24 counts of burglary, as well as 100 counts of abuse of a corpse and dozens of other counts for theft, criminal trespass, receiving stolen property, criminal mischief and intentional desecration of a public monument.
It was the second listing for Gerlach, who was arrested Jan. 6 at Mount Moriah following a series of break-ins there late last year.
Defense counsel Anna Hinchman told Williams at the first listing March 13 that she had received additional discovery in the case and wanted some time to go over it.
According to an affidavit for his arrest written by Yeadon Detective Leah Cesanek and Delaware County Criminal Investigation Division Detective Chris Karr, a total of 26 underground vaults and/or mausoleums at Mount Moriah straddling Delaware and Philadelphia counties were hit between Nov. 7 and Jan. 6.
Detectives used license plate readers to develop Gerlach as a suspect and allegedly caught him red-handed at the Yeadon cemetery. Gerlach allegedly admitted to stealing approximately 30 sets of human remains from Mount Moriah, police said.
He was brought back to the cemetery on Jan. 7 and identified seven underground vaults where he removed a total 15 skulls and other remains, according to the affidavit.
The Delaware County detectives, Ephrata Police Department and assisting agencies served a search warrant at Gerlach’s home the same day and allegedly found more than 100 skulls, long human bones and other assorted skeletal items, including decomposing human torsos, mostly in his basement.
Rouse said at a press conference announcing Gerlach’s arrest in January that of the affected mausoleums, 25 were more than 100 years old, though he noted some remains in Gerlach’s home were clearly much more recent. One had a pacemaker, he said.
A motive was not immediately apparent, but Rouse said at the press conference that investigators were looking into Gerlach’s association with an online social media group apparently dedicated to selling bones. He was unaware if any sales had actually taken place or to whom, or if those buyers could also be held criminally liable.
One post on Gerlach’s Facebook page from June 2025 indicated he was, “Now living alone in the mountains, riding Harleys and slinging skulls.”
In this context, “slinging” could mean selling, which would indicate Gerlach could have been obtaining skulls to sell for about six months before his arrest.
Yeadon Mayor Rohan Hepkins, a member of the Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery Board that became aware of the initial break-ins fairly early on in November and passed his concerns along to Yeadon Police Chief Henry Giammarco, commended Cesanek and Officers Richard Nizza and Jason Benditt at a recent borough council meeting for their work on the case.
Relatives speak
Judy Prichard-McCleary, Bethel Township, and cousin Greg Prichard, Malvern, were among the victims of Gerlach’s alleged robberies in Mount Moriah.
“It just made me sick to my stomach to think that anybody would want to do that,” Judy said outside the courthouse after the hearing. “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. When you die and you’re buried, you should be left alone.”
Judy said her great-great-grandfather, Jonathan Prichard, came to Philadelphia as a young boy in the early 1900s and later lived in Swarthmore where she was raised. He opened a wholesale grocery business and family lore is that he invented the paper bag, though never had a patent for it.
Jonathan built a mausoleum for his family that has nine crypts in it, she said. Five of them were disturbed, but only one body was removed, that of her great-great aunt. Also disturbed were her great-grandfather’s and great-grandmother’s crypts, but those had been sealed with additional bricks after a prior issue.
The crypts for Jonathan Prichard and his wife, Jane, were also disturbed, she said, but they had extra locks so the robber was not able to get to their bodies. Judy said the cemetery has since gone in and cleaned up the mausoleum, and replaced a broken window with cement blocks.
“Mount Moriah’s a very big place. It’s a huge cemetery,” said Greg Prichard. “So the first thought was, ‘Well, what are the chances the Prichard mausoleum was one of the ones hit?’ And it turns out it was. It’s very prominent on the hill there, so it’s unfortunate.”
Greg Prichard said his initial thought was disbelief, but he declined to opine on what kind of punishment the robber should face.
He did note it was interesting to see how different Gerlach looked in person versus pictures of him that he had seen online, wearing a lime-green jumpsuit Friday in court with glasses and long hair pulled back into a tight bun.
“Like with any story you see on the news, when you experience it, when you see the person in real life, it feels different,” he said. “It humanizes the situation, but it doesn’t change any thoughts about what happened.”
Judy and Greg acknowledged it will be years, if ever, for all of the bodies to be sorted out in what would be a painstaking and costly process. She has not heard anything about getting her great-great-aunt’s remains returned.
Judy said the next step will be twofold: Supporting Mount Moriah, which is having a cleanup Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., and changing legislation so things like this cannot happen again.
“To be able to sell body parts on the internet just appalls me and I think it should be stopped,” she said. “There are legitimate reasons to have a corpse if you are a learning institution, and in those cases, people choose to donate their body to science, and that’s their choice. My great-great-grandfather wanted to be buried and I’m assuming all his siblings did as well, because none of them donated their bodies to science.”
Gerlach is scheduled for formal arraignment June 3 also at the County Courthouse. He remains in custody at the county jail in Concord, the George W. Hill Correctional Facility, in lieu of $1 million bail.
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All suspects and defendants are innocent until proven guilty. This story was compiled using public court records.
