About this episode
The episode introduces the dark story of Megan Hess and her mother, who ran a funeral home while secretly selling body parts for profit.
For eight years, Megan Hess ran Sunset Mesa Funeral Home in the small town of Montrose, Colorado. She promised clients discounts on normally expensive cremations, a seeming kindness in a town where many are poor. But in the back of the funeral home, Megan’s elderly mother Shirley was actually dismembering the dead. And then Megan was selling the body parts – heads, torsos, legs – to companies that claim to do medical research. The families who trusted Megan –- they had no idea what she was really up to. When they came to pick up the ashes of their loved ones, they instead received a mixture of ashes of various people. They had no idea of their betrayal until some received a strange phonecall from the FBI. Megan and Shirley were body brokers, trading on a dark network where people buy and sell bodies. What exactly were the two women after? Who was really buying those stolen bodies, and why? Subscribe now to unlock all shows on The Binge and you’ll be the first to access Cover Up: Body Brokers as soon as it drops on January 2, 2024. A Campside Media & Sony Music Entertainment production. Find out more about The Binge and other podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at…
People in this episode
Host: Megan Hess
Topics covered
- body brokers
- funeral home
- medical research
- betrayal
- true crime
Keywords
- body parts
- cremation
- Montrose Colorado
- medical research
- FBI investigation
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Sunset Mesa Funeral Home, FBI, Campside Media
More episodes of Body Brokers
- My Mother's Lies: Did She Frame an Innocent Man? · April 15, 2026 · 8 min
- The Funeral Director · March 5, 2024 · 34 min
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