Law officially criminalizing necrophilia in Michigan passes Senate committee

Photos of Melody Rohrer that sat in front of lawmakers in the Michigan Senate Civil Rights, Judiciary, and Public Safety Committee on May, 16, 2024 as laws to criminalize necrophilia were being considered. In 2021, Rohrer was killed and the prosecution in her case presented evidence that her killer had sexually assaulted her corpse. However, Michigan has no law explicitly criminalizing necrophilia. (Photo: Anna Liz Nichols)

After 45 years of marriage, Richard Rohrer expected he and his wife, Melody Rohrer, would be one of those rare couples that would make it to their 75th wedding anniversary. He told Michigan lawmakers Thursday that Melody was his soulmate and that she was everything that was right in the world.

But on September 20, 2021, his world and his family’s world was turned upside down when a man, Colby Martin, intentionally hit Melody with his car, killing her.

“The evil that did this put her lifeless fractured body into a vehicle going to another location where he repeatedly raped her corpse,” Rohrer told the Michigan Senate Civil Rights, Judiciary and Public Safety Committee. 

Melody’s murderer had hoped that after he abandoned Melody’s body, she would never be found and he would never be caught, Rohrer said. But local and state law enforcement apprehended him the day after the crime and he sits in prison, serving a life sentence for murder.

And although the prosecution presented DNA evidence of sexual assault, as well as searches on Martin’s phone related to necrophilia, Martin was not charged for sexual assault — and there isn’t such a charge on the books in Michigan law anyway.

But Rohrer and other members of Melody’s family are looking to explicitly make necrophilia a crime in Michigan with a series of bills called “Melody’s Law.”

“Most of our family was unaware of the term necrophilia or how it would impact our lives. We were unaware and appalled that there was no federal or Michigan State law against such an act,” Rohrer said. “While we are devastated that the person responsible for Melody’s death was unable to be charged for this particular crime, it will give us peace of mind that no one else will have to endure the same injustice our family has had to endure over the past two and a half years.”

Two photos of Melody were placed in front of lawmakers as Rohrer pleaded with lawmakers to pass a criminalization of necrophilia. He told them stories of Melody, a retired nurse whose love and care for her community could only be rivaled by her love for her family.

“She was best friends with her daughters. She was the ultimate grandma, doing grandma camp, crafts, painting rocks, cooking, shopping, playing games of cards, miniature golf and so much more,” Rohrer said. “All we all have now is memories — no birthdays; no holidays; no school events; no weddings.” 

But it didn’t matter if Melody knew you or not, Rohrer said. Melody spent much of her adult life as a nurse, noting on one occasion during a vacation to Florida, she ran across a parking lot in Georgia to help a homeless person before first responders arrived.

The legislation, SBs 841, 842 and 843, assigns criminal penalties for varying degrees of sexual contact with a dead human body, from sexual contact to sexual penetration, which would carry up to 15 years in prison. The legislation also expands the state’s sexual registry act. 

Typically in legislative committees, testimony is heard for bills and then at a future meeting, a vote is held. But the proposed law’s sponsor, state Sen. Veronica Klinefelt (D-Eastpointe), advised that Rohrer, who now lives out of state, will remain in Michigan until the bills become law.

The Michigan Senate Civil Rights, Judiciary and Public Safety Committee voted the bills through unanimously and they will now head to the Senate floor.

Klinefelt spoke with the Advance ahead of the committee meeting about the nuances of why it’s important for necrophilia to be classified as a sex crime.

Michigan does have laws against desecrating a dead body, but those fail to address the fact that that body still represents a person, at least as far as the family is concerned, Klinefelt said. Even after death, a person’s family has an emotional connection to that body.

“When somebody commits an act of this nature, it’s really important that the conviction represents that and isn’t a lesser conviction that may cause you to believe they did something that could be much less intrusive and less of an evil intent or a sexual intent,” Klinefelt said.

And much like pedophilia, Necrophilia is a criminal compulsion that doesn’t go away unless it’s addressed and stopped, so it needs to be named in law, Klinefelt said. And even if there’s a small number of individuals who perpetrate necrophilia in Michigan, it needs to be addressed.

“One individual is enough,” Klinefelt said. “This crime warrants being addressed, even if it’s one in 100 years.”

Melody’s Law has the support of the governor-appointed Michigan Domestic and Sexual Violence Prevention and Treatment Board (MDSVPTB). Staff Policy Attorney for the board and lead prosecutor in the state’s case against Larry Nassar, Angela Povilaitis, spoke to the implications of the current law, pointing to a 1995 Michigan Court of Appeals opinion clarifying that necrophilia, under the wording of the law, doesn’t constitute criminal sexual conduct.

“We conclude that the crime of criminal sexual conduct requires a live victim at the time of penetration. Our statute … defines third-degree criminal sexual conduct as engaging in non consensual sexual penetration with another ‘person.’ Furthermore, a ‘victim’ is a ‘person alleging to have been subjected to criminal sexual conduct.’  A dead body is not a person. It cannot allege anything. A dead body has no will to overcome. It does not have the same potential to suffer physically or mentally as a live or even an unconscious or dying victim,” the opinion reads.

Melody’s Law is needed to fill a gap in Michigan’s law that fails to give the justice system the tools to seek accountability for “heinous acts,” Povilaitis said.

“These bills would help the families of those victimized after death by providing them with some recourse in the criminal justice system. Those families must already face news of a loved one’s death unexpectedly and live with the knowledge that their loved one’s body was violated for sexual gratification,” Povilaitis said. “To also learn there’s no criminal punishment for such acts provides another level of grief and frustration that I think is evident today when you heard from Rick.” 

Furthermore, Povilaitis noted that MDSVPTB is recommending that necrophilia be added to the list of criminal acts under Michigan’s felony murder statute. 

Michigan law outlines that if a murder is perpetrated either while committing or with the goal of committing certain crimes, it rises to first degree murder, which carries a penalty of life imprisonment without possibility of parole, the harshest penalty in Michigan. Criminal sexual conduct is already included under eligible offenses, as well as child abuse in the first degree, carjacking and kidnapping.

Rohrer said it’s clear to him that the only reason his wife, Melody, was killed was so that the murderer could sexually assault her corpse, a crime of convenience that could have been anybody’s wife, mom, sister, grandmother or friend.

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