Lawmakers Call for Crackdown on Bodies Exhibits

May 21, 2008— -- Click here to read an update on this story.

Twenty-one members of Congress have sponsored a bill that would strike a major blow to the multi-million-dollar industry that puts human bodies on display because they say the bodies could be from executed Chinese prisoners.

Republican Rep. Todd Akin of Missouri introduced the bill that would prohibit the importation of any "plastinated" human body part into this country. Atlanta-based Premier Exhibitions uses "unclaimed" Chinese bodies infused with silicone through a process called "plastination" for display across the nation in an exhibit called, "Bodies…The Exhibition."

"This is a human rights issue about affording human dignities to people around the world," said Rep. Akin, adding that he is concerned that the Chinese people in the exhibit did not give permission for their bodies to be on display. "We cannot verify the source of each body coming from China, so we decided the best approach was to say that in our country, you cannot import plastinated bodies," he said.

Rep. Mike Turner, R-Ohio, is one of 21 co-sponsors of the bill. "I am not confident that the people whose bodies are in this exhibit consented," he said. "China's record on human rights should give us pause in any issue involving human remains imported from that country."

Premier Exhibitions says that the "unclaimed" bodies on display were legally obtained from Dalian Medical University.

ABC News' "20/20" reported earlier this year that the bodies did not come from the university but instead from a private, for-profit lab about 30 miles away. "20/20" interviewed someone who said he was a former participant in the black market, in which, he said, bodies were sold to that lab for $200 to $300 each. Dalian Medical University told ABC News that it severed its ties to the plastination lab several years ago.

Premier's former CEO Arnie Geller, who is still on the company's Board of Directors disputed the allegations on "20/20." He said that his suppliers assured him that "these are all legitimate, unclaimed bodies that have gone through Dalian Medical University."