British police seize 2,000 pictures of bodies taken at mortuary where corpses desecrated
LONDON, Jun 02, 2003 (AP WorldStream via COMTEX) -- Police probing the
desecration of a Muslim woman's body at a hospital mortuary said Monday they
have seized 2,000 photographs, negatives and slides of dead people believed to
have been taken at the mortuary.
Metropolitan Police launched the investigation after staff at Hillingdon
Hospital in west London discovered the 65-year-old woman's body covered with
strips of bacon in January. Islam forbids eating or touching pork products,
which it considers impure.
A police statement said the photographs, which do not depict desecrations, date
back over at least the last 10 years and show bodies of varying age, sex and
ethnic origin.
The images were seized when officers raided the house of a 53-year-old man
arrested in connection with allegations of theft at the mortuary. Police would
not reveal what was stolen, but said it was not body parts. The man was arrested
May 1 and released on bail.
Police also said their investigations had revealed a second desecration case at
the mortuary. The incident, in which the dead woman was covered in pen marks,
occurred in 1996 and was not reported to police at the time, the statement said.
Police said there was no evidence so far linking the two desecrations, the
pictures and the theft - although they were being investigated together.
Copyright 2003 Associated Press, All rights reserved
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