CHICAGO, Illinois (WBBM) — Federal charges were filed against Donald Greene Sr. and Donald Green Jr. -- a Chicago area father and son -- for allegedly selling body parts on the black market from people who thought they were donating to science.
The pair also allegedly sold parts they knew were diseased without telling their buyers.
Bodies known to have HIV, sepsis and hepatitis kept on ice, then sold.
Some were sold for up to $100,000.
The father and son duo was behind the now shuttered Biological Resource Center of Illinois.
Per a search warrant, a mother was told her son’s tissues would be donated to colleges and research centers.
Instead, parts of him sold for $5,000.
In the charges filed, United States attorneys repeatedly call it a scheme "to defraud customers of the Biological Resource Center of Illinois."
It's not illegal to dismember and broker body parts -- per se.
But it is illegal to knowingly sell remains positive for infectious disease.
It is alleged the Greene’s did this from 2008 to 2014.
The federal document charging the Greene’s alleges the men sold to Detroit Medical Center’s sports medicine department at least one specimen that “had previously tested positive for hepatitis. This fact was concealed by Donald A. Greene Sr.'s scheme to defraud."
Greene Sr. is charged with wire fraud.
While Greene Jr. faces a felony for intentionally concealing a crime.
Authorities were led to the Greene’s while investigating Detroit body broker Arthur Rathburn, who is now in federal prison.
