Daughter says report confirms half-brother plans to sell legend's DNA.
By CARRIE JOHNSON
Published August 13, 2003
Ted Williams' oldest daughter slammed the news report on the kitchen table Tuesday evening, her hands trembling with rage.
"I told you!" Bobby-Jo Williams Ferrell shouted at her husband, Mark.
She had just read an excerpt from a Sports Illustrated article that will hit newsstands today. It said her father's head had been severed and 182 DNA samples were taken from his body while at a cryonics company in Arizona. Eight samples are missing.
For more than five months, Ferrell fought to bring the baseball legend's body back to Florida for cremation. She maintained her half-brother, John-Henry Williams, had their father frozen so his DNA could be sold.
"I think this backs up everything Bobby-Jo has been saying all along, that John-Henry planned to sell his father's DNA," Mark Ferrell said Tuesday in a telephone interview from his Citrus County home.
The Sports Illustrated article sheds new light on the macabre saga that unfolded after Ted Williams' death July 5, 2002. The report is based on internal documents, e-mails, photographs and tape recordings supplied by a former employee of Alcor Life Extension Foundation, where Williams' body was flown hours after his death.
Once there, his body was separated from his head in a procedure called neuroseparation, the magazine said.
Williams' head is being stored in a vat filled with liquid nitrogen. The skull has been accidentally cracked 10 times because of fluctuations in storage temperatures at Alcor, the magazine reports.
The body stands upright in a 9-foot tall cylindrical steel tank, also filled with liquid nitrogen.
The article also says John-Henry Williams owes Alcor more than $111,000 for the procedure. According to taped conversations provided by Larry Johnson, Alcor's former chief operations officer, a board member and an adviser from the cryonics company joked about "throwing (Williams') body away," posting it on eBay or sending it in a "frosted cardboard box" C.O.D. to John-Henry's doorstep, to persuade him to pay the bill.
The story also raises questions about Ted Williams' willingness to be frozen. According to the magazine, the consent form was submitted to Alcor after Williams' death and without his signature.
According to his will, Ted Williams wanted to be cremated with his ashes sprinkled off the Florida Keys. After his death, John-Henry and his sister, Claudia, produced a hand-written note that says they entered into a pact with their father to be cryonically preserved after their deaths.
The November 2000 note is written on scrap paper and stained with grease.
Mark Ferrell said he contacted the state attorney's office in Ocala Tuesday and has asked them to launch an investigation.
"I'm mad," Ferrell said. "I'm mad as hell. This is America's horror story."
John Sullivan, a former Williams aide, said his boss never wavered from his plans to be cremated during discussions. He said the news made him deeply sad.
"He was a great man," Sullivan said. "To have him end up like this, it really does pain me."
- Information from the Associated Press was used in this report. Carrie Johnson can be reached at 727 892-2273 or cjohnson@sptimes.com
