CALIFORNIA BRIEFING / LOS ANGELES

A former mortuary worker convicted of carving up and selling cadavers donated to UCLA’s medical school was sentenced to 10 years in prison Thursday and ordered to pay more than $1.7 million in fines, restitution and unpaid taxes.

Jurors had found Ernest Nelson, 51, guilty after a trial that detailed how he and Henry Reid, the former director of UCLA’s Willed Body Program, conspired to sell body parts from donated cadavers to enrich themselves.

“This is one of those cases so outrageous it doesn’t come along very often,” Superior Court Judge Curtis Rappe said.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Marisa Zarate said that although Reid aided in the scheme, it was Nelson who walked into freezers, dismembered bodies, packaged the parts and delivered them to buyers across the country, including to research firms and hospitals.