A Colorado funeral home operator accused of illegally selling body parts and giving clients fake ashes has been sentenced to 20 years in prison
A Colorado funeral home operator accused ofand giving clients fake ashes was sentenced to 20 years in prison Tuesday by a federal court judge.
Megan Hess received the maximum sentence after pleading guilty to mail fraud in November under a plea agreement in which other charges against her were dropped, The Daily Sentinel reported. U.S. authorities said that on dozens of occasions, Hess and her mother, Shirley Koch, who also pleaded guilty to mail fraud, transferred bodies or body parts to third parties for research without families’ knowledge.
U.S. District Judge Christine Arguello in Grand Junction also sentenced Koch on Tuesday to 15 years in prison. Arguello sentenced the pair after victims testified about the pain they'd suffered under the scheme.Hess, 48, and Koch, 69, operated the Sunset Mesa Funeral Home in the western city of Montrose. They were arrested in 2020 and charged with six counts of mail fraud and three counts of illegal transportation of hazardous materials.
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.
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