A sculptor who crafted casts for a London art exhibition from human body parts stolen from the Royal College of Surgeons was sentenced to nine months in prison for theft yesterday.
The judge at Southwark Crown Court, Mr Justice Geoffrey Rivlin QC, described the crime as "revolting".
Anthony-Noel Kelly (42), a nephew of the Duke of Norfolk, used the body parts, including three human heads, part of a brain and 10 legs and feet, to make the sculptures after he was given permission to sketch the remains by the RCS between June 1991 and November 1994.
However, Kelly enlisted a former undertaker's embalmer, Niel Lindsay (25), to smuggle the body parts out of the college, and after the casts were made some of the remains were stored at Kelly's London home while others were buried in a field.
Lindsay was given a six-month sentence suspended for two years.
In the first case of its kind in Britain, the judge ruled that the parts of human bodies were owned and were therefore capable of being stolen. Earlier cases of "body-snatching" have usually seen charges under common law, but Mr Justice Rivlin said that the "disgraceful, criminal and disgraceful" conduct of Kelly warranted a prison sentence.
Neither man had treated the body parts with respect, he said. "Far from it. Most of the body parts were buried in the grounds of a family home by simply putting them in a hole. . . No container was used. The offence was revolting, an affront against every reasonable concept of decent behaviour.
"The offence was a gross breach of trust. The offence was, if discovered, almost bound to do great harm to the Royal College of Surgeons and to the acts of bequest of human body parts to medical science," Mr Justice Rivlin added.
During the case against the men, the court was told that Kelly had referred to a leg that had been stolen as "Hopalong" and after it was used in one silver-plated sculpture it was stored in the attic of Kelly's home.
It also emerged that Kelly had paid Lindsay £400 to steal the body parts from the RCS and that he had travelled to the sculptor's home by taxi and on the Underground carrying the body parts in a plastic bag.
Pointing out that the sentence given to Kelly was not a reflection on his art form, the judge said that it was essential for members of the public to be confident that if they donated their body to medical science it would be used for that purpose and no other.
Outside the court, Kelly's solicitor, Mr Mark Stephens, said his client remained convinced that he had not committed theft.
"Nobody in this case believes we should be cluttering our jails with artists. There are bad people who should be in jail. AnthonyNoel is not one of them.
"I have not discussed the morals of what he has done. . . He did it out of the purity of artistic motives and nothing else."
Kelly's and Lindsay's legal teams have said they intend going to the Appeal Court in an attempt to reverse the ruling and overturn their convictions.