Prosecutors alleged that the men had conspired to take bones, skin, and other body parts secretly from cadavers, without the permission of the families.
The indictments were the latest chapter in a widening scandal that involved scores of funeral homes and hundreds of looted bodies, including that of the ''Masterpiece Theatre" host, Alistair Cooke, who died in March 2004.
The bodies came from funeral homes in New York City, Rochester, Philadelphia, and New Jersey that contracted with the Brooklyn funeral parlor for embalming.
Mastromarino, Micelli, Lee Crucetta, and Christopher Aldorasi allegedly forged birth certificates and consent forms to disguise the fact that some bodies were too old for harvesting techniques.
''I think we can agree that the conduct uncovered in this case is among the most ghastly imaginable," said Rose Gill Hearn, commissioner of the city Department of Investigation. ''It was shockingly callous."
''This case is unique in the utter disregard for human decency," said the Brooklyn district attorney, Charles Hynes.
The 122-count indictment alleges that the defendants forged death certificates and organ donor consent forms to create the appearance that the tissue had been legally harvested. The activities spanned from 2001 to 2005, prosecutors said.
Mastromarino went into the tissue business after losing his license as an oral surgeon, prosecutors said. Micelli was his copartner, they said.
Prosecutors allege that Mastromarino secretly removed bones, tendons, heart valves, and other tissue from cadavers at Micelli's funeral parlor.
A defense lawyer, Mario Gallucci, said in a statement Wednesday that Mastromarino had followed existing rules regulating the harvesting of tissue donated by families at funeral homes.
Mastromarino ''vehemently denies doing anything illegal or wrong," the lawyer said.
Federal and local authorities launched the nine-month investigation after, they said, they received a tip that Mastromarino and others had paid off funeral homes so they could take tissue from the dead without their families' knowledge.
