A woman experienced a shocking revelation after donating her late husband’s body to science, only to find out it had been blown up by the military. Steve Hansen, who had passed away in 2012 from cirrhosis of the liver, had always wanted to donate his organs. However, due to the condition of his organs, doctors deemed them unsuitable for donation. Consequently, hospice workers suggested to his wife, Jill, that she donate his body to science for research purposes.
Jill envisioned Steve’s body being used in a medical facility to help scientists understand the effects of alcoholism. Instead, Steve’s body was transported to the Biological Research Center (BRC) in Arizona and subsequently sold to the Department of Defense without Jill’s consent. She later learned that Steve’s body had been used as a crash test dummy in a simulated Humvee explosion, leading to what court documents described as “the complete mutilation and desecration of the donor’s body.”
Jill was devastated by the news, expressing deep regret and sorrow. She had not consented to this use of her husband’s body and felt betrayed by the process. The BRC founder, Stephen Gore, had sold Steve’s body for military and ballistic tests, actions that were revealed during an FBI raid on Gore’s warehouse in 2014. The raid uncovered such disturbing and graphic scenes that some agents required trauma therapy.
Gore was sentenced to a year in prison with an additional four years on parole. FBI Special Agent Paul Micah Johnson, who has investigated the body and organ donation industry for a decade, emphasized the need for stricter regulations and transparency. He highlighted the importance of a unified set of federal rules to govern all entities dealing with human body parts, both for-profit and non-profit, to prevent such incidents from occurring and to restore public trust in the donation process.
