LANSING, Mich. — A package of bills in the Michigan Senate aim to finally make sexual acts with a dead person illegal. Currently, there are no laws in Michigan that explicitly criminalizes sexual conduct with a dead person.
“I was shocked to find out that necrophilia is not against the law in Michigan,” said Sen. Veronica Klinefelt (D). “I don’t know how common it is … even if it’s a very small amount of people, statistically, nationwide, that would do something like this, that doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be a law against it, there still should be a law against it.”
Senate Bills 841, 842 and 843, introduced by Klinefelt, are in response to the murder of Melody Rohrer.
Rohrer was murdered in 2021 by a West Michigan man who hit her with his car, put her in his trunk and took her body to the woods. It was then alleged by authorities that Rohrer's body was sexually assaulted.
Rohrer's murderer, Colby Martin, was convicted of homicide open murder, failure to stop at the scene of an accident when resulting in death and concealing the death of an individual.
What was absent from both Martin's charges and convictions was a sexual assault of the body of Rohrer.
Now, Sen. Klinefelt is working with the family of Rohrer to create legislation that explicitly makes necrophilia illegal. The legislation is called "Melody's Law" in honor of Melody Rohrer.
“We have worked with her husband and her children to ensure that some of the things that happened to her after her death don’t ever happen again, or at least if individuals behave in that fashion, there’s punishment for it ... We’ve had input with them every step of the way on what we’re doing. It’s extremely important to them and I think it’s fitting that we’re gonna call it Melody’s Law," said Klinefelt.
The new legislation has been referred to committee.
Earlier this year, similar legislation was introduced in the Michigan House. House Bill 5410 also seeks to criminalize both necrophilia and bestiality explicitly. This legislation was also sent to committee, where it has sat since Jan. 30.
While neither bestiality nor necrophilia are explicitly illegal, some Michigan laws could be used to convict people who have engaged in those acts.
MCL 750.158 makes "crimes against nature" illegal. The wording in the statute is:
"Any person who shall commit the abominable and detestable crime against nature either with mankind or with any animal shall be guilty of a felony, punishable by imprisonment in the state prison not more than 15 years, or if such person was at the time of the said offense a sexually delinquent person, may be punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for an indeterminate term, the minimum of which shall be 1 day and the maximum of which shall be life."
That statute could be used to charge some engaging in necrophilia or bestiality, but is still vague in its interpretations.
MCL 750.160 also could be used in some cases to charge people for necrophilia, however it would not necessarily work on all cases. The wording in the statute is:
"A person, not being lawfully authorized so to do, who shall willfully dig up, disinter, remove, or convey away a human body, or the remains thereof, from the place where the body may be interred or deposited, or who shall knowingly aid in such disinterment, removal, or conveying away, or who shall mutilate, deface, remove, or carry away a portion of the dead body of a person, whether in his charge for burial or otherwise, whenever the mutilation, defacement, removal, or carrying away is not necessary in any proper operation in embalming the body or for the purpose of a postmortem examination, and every person accessory thereto, either before or after the fact, shall be guilty of a felony, punishable by imprisonment for not more than 10 years, or by fine of not more than $5,000.00. This section shall not be construed to prohibit the digging up, disinterment, removal or carrying away for scientific purposes of the remains of prehistoric persons by representatives of established scientific institutions or societies, having the consent in writing of the owner of the land from which the remains may be disinterred, removed or carried away."
If Melody's Law is passed and signed into law, it would provide prosecutors with a new tool in charging people who engage in sexual acts with dead people.
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