A US court has ruled that Harvard can be sued by families that had donated dead bodies of relatives to the university’s medical school, which were then sold on the black market by the ex-manager of its morgue.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court on Monday reversed a ruling from a lower court that had until now shielded the university from legal action.

The court also ruled that Mark F. Cicchetti, the managing director of the Harvard Medical School Anatomical Gift Programme, is legally liable.

In his ruling on Monday, Chief Justice Scott L. Kafker described the case as a “macabre scheme spanning several years” that saw the ex-manager Cedric Lodge dissect and steal body parts intended for research and teaching purposes.

Harvard is facing 12 lawsuits from 47 family members of the ind

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