Nowadays, plastic is the norm for creepy skeletons that you see in doctors' offices. However, this wasn't always true. If you have an old medical textbook, you might still be able to find instructions on how to make your own.

Shoichi Murai (a Tokyo resident aged 68) was recently arrested for throwing his brother's skeleton into the trash. He thought it was fake.

VICE World News reports that Murai claimed that he hadn't seen his younger brother in 2017 - even though the siblings lived in the same house. He claims that he was cleaning out the house and noticed what he thought was a model of an actual skeleton on the bed. He removed the skull and jawbone, but left the rest of his bones on the mattress.

Sounds suspicious? It might sound suspicious.

She said that while some of these people might not be truthful, I believe some people who don't see many bones in the natural world may think that some real bones are fake.

Garbage collectors noticed the head and one of the brothers' credit cards that had been lost, and called the police. Murai was charged with abandoning a body. This is a charge that Japanese police often use when investigating whether murder should also be included.

VICE reports that although investigators have yet to release any details about the cause of death, the autopsy showed no evidence of significant injuries to the body. France explained that if there were any unnatural marks on the [...] skull, then it could indicate animal predation or foul play.

One piece of information has been released: The brother was dead for at least a few weeks before his body was discovered. Surprisingly, even this relatively short timeframe can be enough to allow a body's decomposition to occur. France explained that temperature, humidity and solar radiation (which is probably not an issue here), wind (ditto), insects activity (possible), etc. It is not a precise timeline. However, studies have shown that bodies that are left inside can quickly decay and skeletonize if they are given the right conditions.

This story, while it may seem absurd, is not the first such incident. "I have heard of people living in the same house or even the same bed!" France said. France said France didn't report the fact that she had seen a corpse in her house, but she did not report it to IFLScience.

"For instance, an elderly couple in Denver had oxygen delivered to their home every other day for their husband. She said that the delivery men couldn't get into the house due to the smell of decay after the oxygen supply arrived on time. "They called the police and the coroner and discovered that the husband of the woman had died [...] and was heavily decomposed by flies, maggots and other insects."

France explained to IFLScience that while this would be difficult enough to live with, the horror story goes even further: "The wife, who had dementia continued to sleep with him," France said. "[She] told law enforcement she thought he was a deep sleeper."

France stated, "It is hard to believe that someone of normal mental capacity would overlook the telltale signs a brother in decomposing on a floor above in an home." France said, "I would be curious if you knew that tidbit."