Funeral homes in the United States mutilated bodies and sold body parts

Two women, a former funeral director and her mother, were sentenced to lengthy prison terms after selling body parts to people who were going to be cremated without their consent.

Between 2010 and 2018, the two women at the funeral home in Montrose, Colorado, autopsied about 560 bodies, whose organs had been sold to medical education companies, according to reports. BBC. According to the public prosecutor, whole bodies were sold in some cases. The case was dissolved after an investigation by the Reuters news agency, which led to the FBI raiding the funeral home in 2018.

The families of the deceased paid upwards of $1,000 for cremations that never took place. Without the families’ consent, body parts, such as arms, legs, and heads, were resold using forged donation forms. Many of the affected families later learned that they had received urns in which the ashes of their relatives had been mixed with the remains of other people.

“I stole my mother’s heart”

“These women took advantage of vulnerable victims who came to them in their time of grief, but instead of offering guidance, these greedy women betrayed their trust and slandered their loved ones,” said Leonard Carollo, FBI Special Agent in Denver.

During Thursday’s trial, the victims gave moving testimonies.

– When you stole my mother’s heart, you broke mine, – said Nancy Overhoff.

Erin Smith, another relative, says she was there to “hear the click of the handcuffs.”

The case’s judge, Cristina Arguello, described the trial as the “most emotionally draining” she has ever been through. The two women were sentenced to 15 and 20 years in prison, respectively.

Also read: The man died after being sucked into the plane’s engine

Also read: He is suspected of brutal student murders in the United States