Donor Motivations and Final Reflections

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That's fetchpet d. com slash save This week, we wanted to share one of our very favorite episodes We released it back in twenty seventeen And people still write to us about it all the time and I still think about the day, we recorded it What is that you're holding? This is available to jawbone And that skull is in half. Yeah, this person was autopsied. So this is an autopsy cut. So that they can examine the brain And There's a little bag here that says hands and feet. Do those usually get separated because it's It's just there. lots. of little small bones So we put them in a separate bag just so that they don't get scattered out throughout the box, it's easier to keep them together This is dor. Daniel Wescott, the director of the Forensic Anthropology Center at Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas, about thirty miles from Austin We met with him in a nond descript building, a warehouse, really. so plain we drove right past it twice But when you get out of the car and walk to the door, You see a small paper sign with a vulture and a skull And you know, you found it There are very few places in the world that do what they do here While you would think that we would know a lot about how bodies decompose, it actually turns out that we really know very little about what's going on. So the work that's done here is pretty vital to that. At Dr. Wescott's Center, they deliberately set out human bodies to decompose in nature Most of the bodies are lying on the ground, face up with their arms at their sides But researchers also place bodies in trunks of cars, wrap them in tarps and bury them in shallow graves As a culture in some ways, we actually are kind of scared of death and know we embalm bodies so that they don't decompose as fast. and we don't want to see that process going on, but that process does go on. and we need to be able to understand how it works How big is the facility and how many bodies are here The facility is twenty six acres and it sets on a four thousand two hundred acre ranch And we get about seventy donations a year So and then the bodies are usually left to decompose for about six months to several years, depending on the research protocol And then the skeletons come back here. and so we add about seventy skeletons per year to collection So if you had to guess how many bodies are in some state of decomposition here right now, do you know Probably about sixty The bodies are donated. They're called gifted bodies, and the people who plan to donate themselves to the research when they die are called living donors. You know if they want to do something like put me in the trunk of a car to see what happens there or under a tarp or a slab of concrete, I got no problem with This is Grady Earlely, a retired computer science professor who decided long ago that he wanted his body to go to the forensic Anthropology Center. Why did you decide to become a donor I think that everyone should be useful. in life And if you can be useful after death as well So much the better After all Which would you rather do wind up in a box in the ground just wasting real estate, or be in a box in the lab and at least potentially useful to a researcher sometime in future Rrady early remembers when the facility was getting established more than ten years ago, and the university was struggling to find the right location. They needed enough space They also needed a place that wouldn't freak people out. We looked at a side out at the airport Some of the neighbors didn't like the idea and they said, well, it's going attract vultures. so we'll have birds interfering with the aircraft sideide over behind the outlet mall and There were some people that were unhappy with that idea. There's always envies around. He's given money to the facility and become fascinated by what he describes as quote, helping bones tell their story. When his body eventually becomes part of the research, he'll be joining his mother She's already there It was an astonishing thing although in retrospect, I suppose it shouldn't have been when I told my mother what I was planning on doing. She, being a fairly practical woman, said That sounds like a wonderful idea. Sign me up So I did She died at one hundred two Grady says he doesn't really care what happens to him when he goes into the field. Some bodies are placed in the open with the vultures and coyotes, and some are protected by long low cages Some are clothes and some aren't. It all depends on the nature of the experiment. It's odd to think that if all goes as planned, Grady Ely will one day return to the very building where he sat and talked to us in cardboard with the bones of his hands and feet in a small paper bag What I would really like to do is have my skeleton articulated and hung up somewhere in the facility so I can keep my eye on what's going on In his work at Texas State, Dr. Wescott is following in the footsteps of his professor The biggest name in this field, Dror Bill Bass doctor Bass opened the University of Tennessee Anthropological Research Facility in nineteen eighty one It was the first of these so called body farms Although we learned no scientists call them that And he pioneered the idea that we needed a death database If too much time is passed when law enforcement encounters a body They have no way to tell when the person died muchuch less who they were or what happened And the only way to answer these questions is to put a body outside and watch it deceompose I'm Phobe Dudch This is criminal We'll be right back. 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In just a couple of minutes based on a few prompts, it'll pull from different templates to create the website you need Go to squarespace. com slash criminal for a free trial when you're ready to launch choose the offer code, criminal save ten percent off your first purchase of a website or domain criminal comes from Bowen Branch We all need a good night's sleep, but it's not always easy to get it right. Bowen Grantch is giving you the chance to start investing in your sleep. Bo in Branch, you can upgrade your bed and find everything you need to get better sleep. Like their signature organic cotton sheets, soft blankets, and temperature regulating comforters, everything is made to create a bed that supports good sleep and built to get better over time I've tried their bedding myself, and I've been enjoying their signature sheets and organic cotton. 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And so as they do, they start to produce gases and these gases initially will just kind of work their way through the arteries and veins, stuff like that and you get what's called marbling And then it also, then the next kind of step to this is that that gas starts to build up and causes the bodies to go through what's called a bloat stage. So they'll actually kind of puff up How long after death does that happen? It depends on the time of year, but it can range from three or four days to few weeks. Usually here probably within about five days they're going into bloat. Once that happens so then the other thing that's happening is that you're also getting flies that are attracted to the body and those flies are laying eggs and they tend to lay eggs in natural orphes. so they like the eyes, ears, nose, mouth Um, stuff like that. and then they So those maggots will hatch and there again, depends on the species and the temperature. depends on how long it takes. Usually a few days to a week or so And they start feeding on the body as well So you've got that process going on and then you've got the internal organs are decomposing and so Those internal organs are kind of liquefying. With the gas that's building up, that liquid gets pushed out and it's what we call the purge phase. So you get what's called purge fluid. And so it's just a dark fluid Dark. Yeah. What is it it's not blood. What does it mean? No it's just a combination of all the internal organs that have decomposed It's a big place. It is a big place. I so we turn between the two first two tephone points Bodies are placed on Freeman Ranch, which sits off a small highway just a few miles from the lab. Once you pass through the gates, you see what I only imagine you might see on any number of ranches in Texas, cactus, tall green grass, and cows. We just kept driving down a dirt road, taking a left or right whenever we were told to. And then we arrived. The only difference between this part of the ranch and any other was the giant fence and locked gate. So our first stop will be at the shed there to put on booties. Okay In reality, what the booties are for is so that in case you actuallyally step in something, you don't drag it back to your car. Are wow, A you kidding? That's exactly why. everyverybody thinks it's so it's like protecting this scene, but it's actually so that you don't drag home decomp fluid on your shoes. The purge fluid. Right back into the minivan. Right All right. let's see. we'll start this way. So typically the way that this works is The way the bodies are placed depends on what research protocol they're being used in. but typically they're left uncaged on the surface, caged on the surface. buried or wrapped in something. So this is one that's left on the surface Only a few feet from the gate sits the first body. It was hard to pick out at first because of the tall grass around it. And this where individual was originally clothed and then the scattering is from the different scavengers that have come. So we can see a pair of sneakers and a pair of pants and a sock, but then the bones are They all kind of broken apart. Yeah, they're kind of pulled apart at different places. What animal did this? Well, mostly it started out with vultures, and then probably you've had some raccoons and other things come since then. But most of this is vulture activity. I had no idea what to expect when we walked into that field I was nervous about a lot of things, wondering whether I'd be able to get these images out of my head that night when I went to sleep, trying to figure out how I would carry on an interview, while not breathing through my nose Regretting not bringing a change of clothes But this actually seemed okay. That first body hadn't been that bad And then we turned to corner. All right, so the area that we're getting ready. look at this. The area we're getting ready is have actually this right here is as a researcher actually from New York that's here. So she's got bodies on the surface and bodies that are buried. Oh, this is really something So there was a field of bodies under cages, and unlike what we had just seen, these bodies seemed kind of new. All were unclothed. I could see one man in a cage out of my right eye. His stomach was so bloated that it almost touched the top of the cage, and his limbs were spread out to the sides His skin was a mix of black and brown and purple splotatchches I was trying to stay back, but Dr. Wescott went straight form. You can see the maggot's pretty active. Yeah at this stage. And then so this person has gone through bloat guys right? Yeah, but this is wild stuff This is wild stuff. I don't think many people in their lives see stuff like this. So you can see I was talking about the skin kind of becomes really dark associated with the sulfuric gas that's produced by the bacteria and stuff And then you get the active maggot masses going on He kept drawing our attention to things that none of us actually wanted to see up close So we were trying to stay with him, but also just trying to keep our eyes straight ahead. It was hard to know what to do, and it was hot over ninety degrees And then Dr. Wescott took us to a row of bodies under cages which seemed to be showing a progression. So this is kind of going through time in a sense. And you can see that they've gone through bloat, they're actually starting you can see they're starting to dry out Yep So this is we're kind of going through the process here walking down the line. Yeah So you can see there these are starting to get skeletonized How long have these guys been out here? do you think? These have been out here probably a little over a year But you can see now you can't even see the cada decomposition. I you can barely see the body anymore because all that vegetation around it Purge fluid is so nutrient rich that it acts like a super fertilizer, and so bodies in the final stages of decomposition are surrounded by bunches of these tall, healthy wildflowers The flowers are back. The flowers are back, yeah doror Wescott is working on a new project that uses drones and infrared cameras to detect how much organic material is in the soil If law enforcement is trying to locate a missing person in a huge area, five thousand acres, they can use the drone technology to narrow things down, looking for spots with a lot of organic material They're also working with police dogs Most cadaver dogs are trained with small tissue samples It turns out, the dogs don't always know how to react when they encounter a whole body So Police bring their dogs to the ranch to get used to finding the real thing. These different experiments are spread around the ranch. And Texas State collaborates with other facilities. Dror Wescott showed us an experiment where three different centers across the country. placed a body on the exact same day Compare regional differences So the the body that we're looking at right there. seems to me to be Rather new. Dpread individual was probably placed yesterday Oh, that's a brand new body. Is it. Always' that su. We'll be right back. criminal comes from Bombas. If your sock drawer could use an upgrade, Bombus has a range of well designed socks, like their sport socks, which are made with a cushioned, sweat wicking design that also stops them from sliding down your foot while you're in motion. And Bombus has more than socks. They also make soft and breathable basics, including underwear and t shirts This spring, I look forward to going on longer runs, wearing my new Bombus run socks. They're soft and lightweight, made with a mesh knit that makes them breathable, and they're designed with cushioning in the heel and toe to protect your feet Bombas also has a mission. For every item you purchase, they say they donate an item of clothing to someone facing housing insecurity. They say they've made over one hundred fifty million donations and counted. You can go to bombas. com slash criminal and use code criminal for twenty percent off your first purchase. That's BMbS dot com slash criminal Ciminal checkout. We all do it You have a night for yourself but don't like the sound of the silence, so you turn on the TV just for the ambiance. It's a little trick that helps you feel like you've got company and aren't alone And other insurers, well, they may make you feel alillone But when you switch to GICo, you've got claims reps available around the clock So whenever you need, you'll have people around to help And let's turn on the washing machine, just for good measure Isn't that soothing? It feels good to have support. It feels good to Gaica Our last stop was a clearing with three shallow graves. On the day we visited, they were in the process of excavating the skeletons. The excavation was being done by more than twenty students, all women A lot of this work is done by women. Dr. Wescott is the only male director in the country, and almost all of his colleagues and his graduate students are women. Dr. Kate Bradley was in charge of the excavation. It's interesting, I think to do this kind of work to look at all of these dead bodies basically and all of these human remains in the lab I see a skeleton. I see a task at hand. I see a job that I have to do, particularly with the forensic cases that come in We have a job to help identify those. So going in there, analyzing the skeleton, that's what we do For me, it's different when I walk out to this the Frens Gathather Paology Research Facility, where people donate their bodies because here When I see remains, I see people who donated their bodies. This was their last wish. This is what they wanted to do. So for me, it's very nice comoming out here, seeing them in their final resting place, and it's very natural. They just return to the earth. Are you a donor I am a donor Are other members of your family No, nobody else wants to do this but me. My husband is pretty uneasy about it, but I've looked at so many skeletons, I've built my career on looking at skeletons. so I think it's only right that I give back Just listen to the birds Yeah, it's incredibly peaceful. Yeah. It's a beautiful place to be On our way out, we made one last stop The same stop that all the bodies make before they leave the ranch, the processing lab What does the kettle do? It it just simmers them for a little bit so it loosens up all the soft tissue Oh yes, they really are just giant soup kettles But then what's the crock pot for? smallmall hands and feet and stuff like that in small bones so a lot of times it's easier to finish them off in there. And then so they're cooked in here and then they're right over here and they scrub them all down. What are these little guys down here? Tips your fingers. That's a fingertip. Yeahep And these are all toes, and you can see the little teeny toes. And then these little things right there, these are actually extras. they're not even included in the two hundred six. It looks like wood. This bone almost looks like wood. Yeah. It kicks on the color of the soil We saw two complete skeletons laid on metal gurneys and organized anatomically It's amazing to see how fragile our ribs are. We were very lucky to be permitted to visit Normally, only law enforcement and researchers are allowed in. Even if you decide to donate your body, you'll never be able to see this place while you're alive. Pople do ask Well, usually when someone calls, they say something along the lines of I'm interested in donating my body to science and I hear that you take bodies If you call for information, you'll speak with Lauren Mackkel And so I let them know about the Forensic Anthropology Center and how their body can help identify missing persons, and they usually get very excited about that. and They ask about some of the research projects that they werere doing. spepecifically about the vulture studies. Pe are really interested in vulture consumption of human remains. Like they want to be part of that study or they do not want to be part of that study. Many people actually are very interested in being part of that study. They see it as a sky burial So It's something that It seems peaceful, I suppose You can actually make requests and they'll try to honor them You can ask to wear a certain item of clothing or a piece of jewelry You can ask to be placed under a tree One man asked to be placed with a cell phone And they did it You'll also call to ask about the status of a friend or family member So people say, I'm just wondering if they're all decomposed now and they're back inside. Yes I think that's the question I would want to know too, if someone was if you had got them off the ground and back in the box. Yes, and usually people are surprised by how long it takes to because sometimes it can be six months if we're doing a study where Someone has dropped in a tarp for instance and they skeleton us really quickly and then we can pick them up reallyally fairly soon after their death But for the most part, they stay out there for about two years Many of the donors have spent their life in education. and see this as a way to continue teaching after they've died And many work in law enforcement. and have seen the value of the research firsthand I kind of see it as an extension of being an investigator Elaine Walker is a retired private investigator And last year She made the decision to donate her body to the Forensic Investigation Research Station in Colorado How do you like retired life It's the best job I've ever had Oh good. I loved my job, but this is the best job I've ever had Mask how old you are sixty seven. You're sixty seven But you why not donate your body to science in another way, like organ donors? Is There's something about the I guess that there's no investigative quality when you donate your liver Well, no, but I am an organ donor However, at my age Some of my organs are, you know, wouldn't really work out in somebody else's body. They're a little on the old side How do you imagine the body farm? Peaceful, have you seen pictures No, I haven't seen pictures. I would imagine it's peaceful. it is out away from civilization and I imagine that there are just bodies laying there and birds coming in to feast on them That doesn't bothered me at all that I'm going to be eaten That's a wild thing to be talking about, isn't it Yes, it is What did you tell your family when you signed up? How did they respond My husband isn't very excited about it, but he respects that that's what I want to do. What will your husband? When he dies That's a good question because he won't discuss it He's so terrified of death, he won't discuss it Wh isn't that interesting? It's like opposite ends of the spectrum Yes, it really is. So But I did tell him that I was going to send him off the cheapest way possible if he doesn't tell me what he wants But he still won't tell me what he wants. Elaine was the fourth person we spoke with who planned to donate their body to a body farm but whose spouse refused to even talk about it Even Dror Bill Bass, the pioneer of the body farm, is leaving the decision up to his wife Since that trip I keep thinking about one particular part of Freeman Ranch tatch of woods off the main path. It was greener than other places, shady Dctor Wescott stopped us there and asked us to listen to the birds Right in front of us, there is a body under a tree prrotected from the sun Someone who thought they might be able to do some good someomeone who agreed to be placed outside under the trees with the bugs until they disappear is created by Lauren Sporer and me Nadia Wilson is our senior producer Katie Bishop is our supervising producer Our producers are Susanna Robbertson, Jackie Schico, Lillily Clark, Lena Sillison, and Meghgan Kanane This episode was originally mixed by Rob Byers. Our show is mixed and engineered by Veronica Simonetti Special thanks to Sergeant Zachary McBride of the Guadalupe County Sheriff's Office and Alice Wilder