The body broker case is national news. Authorities have been unable to identify three body parts found in the Arizona desert. They have already identified six other victims from Washington state. Walter Mitchell is charged with abandoning at least 6 bodies from Washington in a desert.
“Three DNA profiles did not match any of the known victims,” read a public records requested memo dated Sept. 9, 2021. The police reports were written by the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office in Arizona. The office tracked the human remains back to a former Seattle company called FutureGenex and its owner Walter Mitchell.
Mitchell has pleaded not guilty to 29 counts of abandoning a dead body. Mitchell has a long history in the non-transplant anatomical donation business. FutureGenex was a company that accepted donations of human bodies and then sold body parts to medical and educational firms for research and training.
In December 2020 sheriff’s deputies responded to calls from citizens who reported finding body parts. Mitchell closed his Seattle business in February of 2020. He took about a half dozen dissected bodies with him. He loaded it all in dry ice in a U-haul trailer and went to Arizona according to court documents.
A total of 24 body parts would be found over a two-day search. They found five human heads at another scene. Investigators quickly ruled out homicide because of medical gauze and tags scattered with some of the body parts – ID tags and labels that led them to FutureGenex and Walter Mitchell.
Walter Mitchell was recommended as an alternative when other institutions turned them down. This was a violation of A UW university policy that prohibits the medical school from referring potential body donors to private whole body donation firms.
Maybe understanding the trouble that lies ahead, Mitchell refused to answer questions. He is charged with possession of an explosive device as well as the obvious dumping of body parts.
