Pennsylvania Ping!
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Posted on 01/08/2026 8:23:13 PM PST by texas booster
A 34-year-old man was allegedly caught breaking into a grave at Mount Moriah Cemetery in Yeadon Borough on Monday night, leading authorities to a Lancaster County home where police found more than 100 human skeletal remains, the Delaware County District Attorney's Office said Thursday.
Jonathan Gerlach, of Ephrata, is charged with a slew of offenses amid an investigation into a series of grave robberies at the historic cemetery that spans parts of Yeadon and Southwest Philadelphia along Cobbs Creek. Mount Moriah contains more than 150,000 grave sites, including remains that date back to the Revolutionary War, and is the state's largest cemetery at more than 160 acres.
The investigation began in November when volunteers at the cemetery reported repeated desecrations of mausoleums and underground vaults in the Yeadon section of Mount Moriah. Between Nov. 7 and Jan. 6, a total of 26 grave sites had been broken into or damaged. The stolen remains included full and partial skeletons, name plates, jewelry and other items, prosecutors said.
In late December, detectives began monitoring license plate readers surrounding the cemetery to identify a vehicle that traveled to and from the area during the period of the alleged thefts. Gerlach's Toyota RAV4, which had never been observed near Mount Moriah before the robberies started, was traced to the area near the cemetery in both Yeadon and Philadelphia on numerous occasions in November and December — including Halloween and Christmas Eve, prosecutors said. Detectives later spotted Gerlach leaving the cemetery carrying a burlap bag, crowbar and other items. Inside the bag were two mummified remains of small children, three skulls and other bones. Gerlach was taken into custody and showed police the vault he had just broken into with a crowbar, prosecutors said.
(Excerpt) Read more at phillyvoice.com ...
This creep had a girlfriend?
Toe bone connected to the foot bone; the foot bone connected to the ankle bone; ankle bone connected to the knee bone,....
I’m diggin’ up bones (diggin’ up bones)
I’m diggin’ up bones (diggin’ up bones)
Exhumin’ things that’s better left alone
I’m resurrectin’ memories of a love that’s dead and gone
Yeah, tonight, I’m sittin’ alone, diggin’ up bones
The dude had epic boners.
My understanding is there a collector trade in human bones.
I hear there’s someone for everyone in this world.
I can’t imagine though........
Pennsylvania Ping!
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Shocking, isn’t it? Or is it, these days? In these situations I always wonder what went off and tipped the balance of the equation in her head to think, “I gotta be with this guy.”
He is what the old folks called a ghoul**.
I doubt they will be able to detain him for long, ghouls have ways of escaping.
Gerlach the Ghoul:
** https://www.britannica.com/topic/ghoul
************************************************
ghoul, in popular legend, a demonic being believed to inhabit burial grounds and other deserted places. In ancient Arabic folklore, ghūls belonged to a diabolical class of jinn (spirits) and were said to be the offspring of Iblīs, the prince of darkness in Islam. They were capable of constantly changing form, but their presence was always recognizable by their unalterable sign—ass’s hooves. Considered female by the ancients, the ghūl was often confused with the siʿlā, also female; the siʿlā, however, was a witchlike species of jinn, immutable in shape. A ghūl stalked the desert, often in the guise of an attractive woman, trying to distract travelers, and, when successful, killed and ate them. The sole defense that one had against a ghūl was to strike it dead in one blow; a second blow would only bring it back to life again. The ghūl, as a vivid figure in the Bedouin imagination, appeared in pre-Islamic Arabic poetry, notably that of Taʾabbaṭa Sharran. In North Africa it was easily assimilated into an ancient Berber folklore already rich in demons and fantastic creatures. Modern Arabs use ghūl to designate a human or demonic cannibal and frequently employ the word to frighten disobedient children. Arabic:ghūl Anglicized as ghoul, the word entered English tradition and was further identified as a grave-robbing creature that feeds on dead bodies and on children. In the West ghouls have no specific image and have been described (by Edgar Allan Poe) as “neither man nor woman…neither brute nor human.” They are thought to assume disguises, to ride on dogs and hares, and to set fires at night to lure travelers away from the main roads. **********************************
Holds up skull: “Alas poor Yorick, I knew him, Horatio!”
Probably some kind of Role Play going on between the two of them. Sick things!
“They will dig up our graves, make flutes of our bones, and blow a hymn to the memory of the orphans of God.”
~ Mark Heard
Interesting. I was expecting some single, white old guy.
Bible
Ezekial 37.
Beginning passages:
37 The hand of the Lord was on me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. 2 He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. 3 He asked me, “Son of man, can these bones live?”
I said, “Sovereign Lord, you alone know.”
4 Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! 5 This is what the Sovereign Lord says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life. 6 I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the Lord.’”
He was just an excitable boy.
He looks exactly like I thought he would.
Perp looks like he belongs in the Movie “Phantasm”. Yeeesshh!
I’ll bet people are dying to find out more to this story.
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