Man in Donor Tissue Investigation Speaks

Thursday, August 24, 2006

By Gerrick Brenner

(08/24/06 -- CARY) (WTVD) -- The Raleigh man at the center of an investigation about human body parts is speaking out.

Phil Guyett says he is not to blame for any mix-ups between inaccurate death certificates and human body parts. Some of those body parts came from dead cancer victims and I.V. drug users and ended up in living patients.

Guyett would not sit down for an on-camera interview with Eyewitness News, but he says even though he recovered human tissues from cadavers in Raleigh, screening their health risks and true cause of death was not his responsibility.

Guyett's Donor Recovery Service collected human body tissues for larger processing companies, which then sold them to hospitals and research labs. Guyett says the federal government has its facts wrong when it blames him for mislabeling body parts with wrong death certificates.

"My business was in recovery," said Guyett. "I was not a screener...I was never trained as a screener."

Michael Rulison and the Funeral Consumers Alliance of the Triangle hosted Guyett last year at a conference on organ donation.

"His presentation was short," Rulison said. "As far as I can see, fully professional, technically correct."

Guyett and Carolina Donor Services, the federally sanctioned organ collecting agency for the area, hope the investigation does not keep people from donating.

"They should just ask a little bit about the company, who you are, who are you registered with, who are you certified with, and how do you conduct business," said Burt Mattice of Carolina Donor Services.

Guyett says the problem is bigger than his business that once operated out of a small Raleigh warehouse. He blames the company who bought his human tissues.

"The processor determines suitability of the donor and the release of the tissue," Guyett said. "It's obvious they just took what I gave them and just ran with it."

The Food and Drug Administration has ordered Guyett to halt his Donor Recovery Service, but he says it has been closed since December. So far, the FDA knows of no one who has complained of sickness from these human tissue transplants.

Guyett has moved his family back to California because of stress, he says.

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