An Indianapolis resident reportedly got into the Indiana Medical History Museum during several instances in the past year, and took 60 containers with human brain tissue and preserved material USA Today reported Wednesday.
David Charles faces charges of theft, marijuana possession, and paraphernalia possession according to court documents USA Today reported. Charles may also be brought up on other charges according to information from the Marion County prosecutor's office USA Today reported.
"It's horrid anytime a museum collection is robbed," Mary Ellen Hennessey Nottage, executive director at museum told USA Today. "A museum's mission is to hold these materials as cultural and scientific objects in the public interest. To have that disturbed to have that broken is extraordinarily disturbing to those of us in the museum field."
An individual in San Diego notified the museum of the incident when he found labels on the six products he purchased from eBay for $600, including $70 shipping cost, and figured something wasn't right USA Today reported.
Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department detectives tracked the man's information, and purchases he made. Detectives also interviewed the person who gave the brain tissue to the buyer of the eBay products USA Today reported.
Police implemented a sting operation Dec. 16 where an official or eBay middleman met with Charles in a Dairy Queen parking lot the day after leaving with the jars according to police and court documents USA Today reported.
Officials moved in after the transaction was made. Someone Charles was with reportedly tried to grab a handgun until police officers took him down to the ground USA Today reported.
The organ tissues were from 2,000 people who had their bodies examined starting in the 1890s until the 1940s.
The items have been given back to the museum.
"He just said he liked to collect odd things," Nottage told USA Today.
