Megan Hess, 46, was sentenced Tuesday at a hearing in Grand Junction, Colorado for dissecting 560 . Hess had been scheduled to go on trial in three weeks along with her mother, Shirley Koch, who also previously pleaded not guilty. A Colorado funeral home operator accused of illegally selling body parts and giving clients fake ashes was sentenced to 20 years in prison Tuesday by a federal court judge. Bill's Auto Parts owner, died Sunday. All he was supposed to do was come and harvest the tissue and send the samples down to the processors," defense lawyer Mario Gallucci said. More than 200 Pennsylvanians got tissue that came directly from the Garzone funeral homes, according to the grand jury report. The grand jury found that the three men collected more than $183,000 from those families and $84,000 more from welfare. An attorney for Gerald Garzone did not return a phone call seeking comment. "Both Louis and Gerald continue to run their businesses, pretty much as they did before," the report said. The pair charged customers $1,000 or more for cremations that never occurred. In fact, the grand jury said, the lack of oversight helped Mastromarino go undetected for years, and it recommended a raft of changes that state and federal overseers should make. "No penalty is too harsh for these guys, for the just unbelievably craven nature of what they did," Philadelphia District Attorney Lynne Abraham said at a news conference. Thanks for contacting us. Ms. Hess altered lab reports so that they said that people had tested negative for diseases like H.I.V. Lawyers for Ms. Hess did not immediately reply to requests for comment on Tuesday. Five indicted for selling body parts . Add to Compare. A Colorado woman who operated a funeral home pleaded guilty to fraud this week after being accused of stealing and selling bodies and body parts, officials said. The funeral-home directors and their partners, two men who bought the tissue for resale, then falsified paperwork to make the "donors" appear healthy, the report said. "My job is to make sure he doesn't do additional time just She could face up to 20 years in prison. FBI agents found that Hess forged dozens of body-donor consent forms. As with other commodities, prices for bodies and body parts fluctuate with market conditions. Market data provided by Factset. Tissue Services of Fort Lee, N.J., ran the scheme with help from a A Warner Bros. Legal Statement. 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Several funeral home operators in New York have also pleaded Donate bone marrow for up to $3,000. of death to make it appear the body parts were more fresh, The empty Sunset Mesa Funeral Directors & Donor Services in Montrose, Colorado. for days, sometimes in alleys beside the funeral home, until a 8-year-old cheerleader dies after Fourth of July parade ac Canadian teacher with size-Z prosthetic breasts placed on paid leave, What's next for Buster Murdaugh after dad's murder conviction, life sentence, Murdaugh son collapsed outside court after sitting stone-faced through dad's 6-week murder trial: source, Hated Tom Sandoval addresses Ariana Madix split amid cheating claims, Kelly Osbourne posts first photo of baby son as he hangs out with uncle Jack, Greys Anatomy alum Isaiah Washington retiring from acting: The haters have won, Max Scherzer's first look at the new pitch clock, Chris Rock Jokes About Watching Emancipation to See Will Smith Getting Whipped In Advance of Netflix Special: Report, Kellyanne Conway and George Conway to divorce. In any case, the documents say, on hundreds of occasions the funeral home operators would sell heads, torsos, arms, legs or entire human bodies. Colorado Funeral Home Director Sentenced to 20 Years in Jail for Illegally Selling Body Parts. Still, the authorities said, families typically paid $1,000 or more for a cremation that often never occurred. Experts estimate that a single body can be worth $100,000 in parts, and the industry as a whole has topped $1 billion in revenue per year. The three men were paid $1,000 for each body by Biomedical Tissue Services of Fort Lee, N.J., the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office said. Screen for heightened risk individual and entities globally to help uncover hidden risks in business relationships and human networks. A former Colorado funeral home operator pleaded guilty this week to stealing and selling human remains and body parts that were intended for cremation, federal prosecutors said. Michael Mastromarino, who operated the now-defunct Biomedical Tissue Services of Fort Lee, N.J., ran the scheme with help from a team of "cutters" who stole the body parts, authorities said. Reuters provides business, financial, national and international news to professionals via desktop terminals, the world's media organizations, industry events and directly to consumers. The lucrative parts were Koch's change-of-plea hearing is set for July 12. 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 federal court. Agnes Folger believes the body of her 81-year-old husband, This is a common price to purchase funeral flowers. 2023 Cable News Network. plea there last month. Tweet. PHILADELPHIA Three funeral directors sold hundreds of bodies to a former oral surgeon who allegedly collected the bones, tissue and skin from the corpses to be used in transplants, a grand jury charged Thursday after a 16-month investigation. He and Assistant District Attorney Bruce Sagel expect Megan Hess was sentenced to 20 years in prison and her mother, Shirley Koch, received 15 years for their involvement in the scheme to sell the human remains to body broker services, according to federal prosecutors. 2023 FOX News Network, LLC. The Associated Press. Mastromarino will also testify, if necessary, against his As part of a plea agreement, eight other criminal charges against Ms. Hess were dropped. He said he anticipated that prosecutors would ask for a high bail at an arraigment today. The two men were expected to surrender to Philadelphia authorities this week. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. One Philadelphia woman who believes she contracted hepatitis from a tainted body part is pursuing a civil suit. with the body parts being transplanted in unsuspecting medical The three funeral-home directors - Louis Garzone, 65; his brother Gerald Garzone, 47; and James A. McCafferty Jr., 37 - were accused of plundering 244 cadavers between February 2004 and September 2005. Mastromarino - and the sensational accusations against him - first drew national headlines last year when he and three employees were charged in Brooklyn, N.Y., in a 122-count indictment. Updated. The funeral directors forged death certificates that said the donors had died of heart attacks or blunt-force trauma but were otherwise healthy, prosecutors said. Wales, and James McCafferty, 37, of Philadelphia, have pleaded not Your effort and contribution in providing this feedback is much Lee Cruceta, a former nurse who allegedly ran the cutting crew. Charges also were filed against Louis and Gerald Garzone's funeral homes and the crematorium, but not the McCafferty funeral home. Selling organs such as hearts, kidneys and tendons for transplant is illegal in the United States. The company sold the parts to treat burns, replace broken bones and provide for other medical needs, the 111-page indictment said. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. who lost his oral surgery license amid unrelated drug charges, and Hess has been free on bond since her arrest. cannot be certain of her claim because of the lack of records or a PHILADELPHIA (AP) - April 4, 2008 But prosecutors here are balking at any 2-for-1 deal. Powered and implemented by FactSet Digital Solutions. Quick view $ 114.95 . Joseph, was plundered before his April 2004 cremation. Megan Hess, 46, pleaded guilty to fraud in July. 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. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. The black-market sales occurred from at least February 2004 through September 2005, prosecutors said. Two family members and one friend of deceased people whose body parts were sold without permission by Hess spoke at the hearing. and hepatitis when they had actually tested positive, according to the authorities. last year but continued to run their two homes in Philadelphia, A former Colorado funeral home operator has pleaded guilty to stealing and then selling hundreds of human bodies or body parts to people who were buying the remains for scientific, medical or . Instead of cremating the bodies, she harvested heads, spines, arms and legs and then sold them, according to court records. In some cases, the pair would ship bodies and body parts that tested positive for or belonged to people who had died from infectious diseases such as Hepatitis B and C and HIV after certifying to buyers that the remains were disease-free, the news release said. 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 . All he was supposed to body, but the Philadelphia woman believes the missing age and cause Three funeral directors sold 244 corpses for about $1,000 each to a New York businessman who trafficked in the resale of often-diseased body parts, a grand jury charged Thursday. Access unmatched financial data, news and content in a highly-customised workflow experience on desktop, web and mobile. According to NBC, Hess is scheduled to be sentenced in January. Mastromarino has pleaded not guilty to the New York charges. Dozens of patients, including some from Philadelphia and New Jersey, said they contracted hepatitis C after getting a transplant. parts, Peruto said. The Sunset Mesa Funeral Directors & Donor Services building sits empty in Montrose, Colorado, in 2018. Second plea in U.S. funeral home scheme to sell body parts. 2023 FOX News Network, LLC. About a month after the Reuters stories, the FBI raided the site and state regulators shuttered the funeral home and crematory. at least 244 corpses. They have four or five deaths a day. Much of the tissue was taken from people who were unsuitable donors because their age or the condition of their bodies, or because they had infections such as hepatitis or HIV, according to a 103-page grand jury report. "Hess, and at times Koch, would meet with families seeking cremation services, and would offer to cremate the decedents' bodies and provide the remains back to the families," the DOJ added, stating that the funeral home "would charge $1,000 or more for cremations, but many never occurred.".