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A subscription helps you access more of the local stories that keep you connected to the community. Ms. Koch has pleaded not guilty, but she has a change of plea hearing scheduled for July 12. 1:59 PM EST, Thu January 5, 2023. Megan Hess, 46, was sentenced Tuesday at a hearing in Grand Junction, Colorado for dissecting 560 . PHILADELPHIA (AP) - April 4, 2008 They each pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud and aiding and abetting. Both Hess and Koch originally had pleaded not guilty to the charges. GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. A Colorado funeral home operator accused of illegally selling body parts and giving clients fake ashes has pleaded guilty to mail fraud in . woman who believes she contracted hepatitis from a tainted body (Reuters) -A former Colorado funeral home owner was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison on Tuesday for defrauding relatives of the dead by dissecting 560 corpses and selling body parts without permission. A grand jury indictment said that from 2010 through 2018, Hess and Koch offered to cremate bodies and provide the remains to families at a cost of $1,000 or more, but many of the cremations never occurred. Funeral Home Operator Pleads Guilty in Illegal Body Part Scheme, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/05/us/colorado-funeral-home-owner-body-parts-guilty.html. The 244 bodies fetched about $1,000 each, the grand jury found, with the body parts being transplanted in unsuspecting medical patients worldwide. plea with New York prosecutors, he agreed to forfeit $4.68 million. alleged underlings, three funeral home operators from North Hess, 45, admitted on Tuesday that through her funeral home, located in the town of Montrose in the western part of the state, she defrauded at least a dozen families seeking cremation services for deceased relatives. team of "cutters" who stole the body parts, authorities said. 3 charged with selling body parts - NBC News charged. guilty. The Garzone brothers each own a funeral home and McCafferty was the director at a funeral home owned by his mother, the report said. directors were in charge of getting consent. Three Philadelphia funeral-home directors were charged yesterday with turning their businesses into gruesome human chop shops that pilfered bones and tissue from the dead to fuel a booming, $1 billion transplant industry. July 8, 2022 - The owner of a Colorado funeral home has pleaded guilty to federal charges of mail fraud after the FBI uncovered an operation to sell body parts of deceased . Despite surrendering their licenses, the two Garzone funeral homes have continued operating under the control of a third brother, James, who revived a dormant Pennsylvania funeral home director license. One "He was victimized by the funeral directors. In 2003, the grand jury noted, an employee at a tissue- processing company described Mastromarino as "one of the leading procurers in the country," who was providing "a phenomenal amount of stuff. "For one thing, cremations made it easier to deceive the next of kin.". last year but continued to run their two homes in Philadelphia, The Garzone brothers voluntarily surrendered their funeral director licenses last year, and the state revoked McCafferty's in an unrelated case about a month ago, officials said. A Colorado funeral home operator was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for cutting up the bodies of 560 people and selling the parts without permission. Several funeral home operators in New York have also pleaded Hess and her mother, Shirley Koch, 66, were first arrested for "illegally selling body parts or entire bodies without the consent of the family of the deceased," by the U.S. Department of Justice in March 2020. The highest prices . Donate your sperm to earn up to $1,500/mo! The empty Sunset Mesa Funeral Directors & Donor Services in Montrose, Colo., on Oct. 24, 2018.