[00:00:11] Incredibly widespread impact on the community.
There was a Facebook page created for victims of, of Megan Hess, victims of Sunset Mesa.
It was called that.
And there were hundreds of people in there.
And their stories were all the same, you know.
It’s devastating to that community.
[00:00:50] Bob: Welcome back to The Perfect Scam.
I’m your host, Bob Sullivan.
Grow is convinced that some bodies are being donated against their family’s wishes.
Brian suspects something else happened, and he’s decided to inform Shirley.
[00:01:45] Brian Grow: I had called her first.
And you know, part of our approach has always been complete transparency.
[00:02:28] Bob: So Brian calls Shirley’s daughter.
And as soon as he said that, I knew where this was going.
[00:03:15] Bob: As Diana talks with Brian, she puts the pieces together almost immediately.
That nagging feeling she’d had for months; it all makes sense now.
That’s why Megan at Sunset Mesa couldn’t find her stepfather’s remains because they’d been sold.
She hadn’t heard any of the evidence yet, but inside she already knows the horrible truth.
And I, it was almost, I want to say it was almost a relief.
That must have been a shock.
[00:04:40] Diana McBride: It was, it was a, a huge shock.
And I, you know, told my daughter about it and a couple of our close friends.
And I think really most of us don’t want to know.
[00:05:33] Diana McBride: I started out slowly.
But I did say that to her.
And she said, “I would hear in my head someone would say, ‘No.'”
And I said, “Well Mom, why didn’t you ever tell me that?”
[00:07:04] Bob: So the Reuters reporter plans a trip to visit Shirley in person.
[00:07:08] Brian Grow: You know, Montrose is not a very big place.
It’s not particularly affluent by any means.
And Shirley had lived there for a long time.
She was absolutely lovely.
We talked about Cactus.
She had lots of pictures and mementos.
I mean it was bizarre.
And it was highly suspicious.
[00:08:51] Brian Grow: Now recall, this was a family-run business.
So Megan was the, the face of the business.
But she had no experience.
You know no training.
[00:09:52] Bob: Brian, Brian, this sounds like a horror movie.
[00:10:52] Bob: But did you have nightmares while doing this story?
And they live in a camper in a trailer park.
And that broker sold us two heads and a spine.
The spine turned out to be their son’s spine.
And it was heartbreaking.
I’ve never had an experience like that as a reporter where the emotion was just so high.
[00:13:04] Bob: And however painful, the truth is always better, right?
[00:13:06] Brian Grow: Absolutely.
It was literally trying to get to the bottom and what was factual.
[00:15:03] Bob: It sounds like there was no hesitation for you.
I mean at–, that, this is a big choice to get involved in something like this.
And so I was careful with the first phone call with my mom approaching it.
[00:16:15] Diana McBride: No, it wasn’t.
And I would have conversations with him, and then the next conversation would be the next step.
And he’d say, “Well how do you feel about this?
And how do you think your mom’s going to feel about this?”
and so she had time to process it, and you know, mentally digest it.
[00:18:04] Diana McBride: Yes, so they did a very thorough report.
They can actually date things and, and you know, that whole scientific process is fascinating to me.
It was another step where, oh my gosh, now we definitely know we dont have Cactus.
But what was interesting is included in with the cremains were all types of pieces of metal.
There were metal rivets in there.
There were pieces of metal from a metal zipper.
So he had no metal on him.
He had no wristwatch on him.
So it was an outright criminal organization.
[00:20:29] Brian Grow: Correct.
[00:20:32] Bob: That’s just hard to even imagine.
[00:20:34] Brian Grow: It is hard.
So what happens next?
And at this time, she was still in operation and still doing business.
And nothing was ever done.
[00:22:54] Bob: Even though there were hundreds of these complaints.
[00:22:57] Diana McBride: Yes.
[00:22:58] Bob: Wow.
And that would be the end of it.
[00:23:15] Bob: But that wasn’t going to be the end of it for Diana.
What is the determination?
And I thought, thank God, thank God they’re shutting her down.
And I think within two weeks after that, the FBI raided her facility.
[00:24:47] Bob: And now you have a sense like justice is going to be served.
She, she wanted it as a platform for, for the victims to all communicate with each other.
And so I joined that, and I wasn’t ever really active on it.
I didn’t go on there and tell my story.
You know, it’s sort of like a support group.
She’s charging people, (chuckle) and then she’s making extra money off the side.
[00:27:42] Brian Grow: Incredibly widespread impact on the community.
And there were hundreds of people in there.
It’s incredible, it’s devastating to that community.
And the company does it anyway, and there’s no crime?
So it’s a pretty arduous process.
You know, do you know where he went?"
Apparently they went through all her computers and everything.
You know, it, it kind of made sense in my head.
So I thought, darn, I kinda did myself a disservice by calling her and doing that.
And it was difficult for me.
And I thought, oh my God, he ended up in the Middle East.
And so it was very hard for me.
It took a, a long time before I told my mother that.
I really debated because I didn’t want, you know, her upset.
It’ll never be put to rest.
It’ll, it’ll be, how do I say this?
In so many cultures the dead are treated with such respect and reverence.
And this is, is such an egregious violent act against that.
Um, it’s the opposite of respecting the dead.
[00:34:00] Bob: I’m so sorry.
That must be just such a, I, I can’t imagine what that feels like.
And so I grieve really, my, my, my sadness and is really for my mom.
I want her to get some kind of closure out of this.
I really, I want this more than anything for her.
[00:34:58] Bob: Two more years go by, it’s now four years since Cactus died.
Some of the body parts sold came from victims who carried infectious diseases.
Koch, her mom, is sentenced to 15 years.
She kept coming back to this sort of theme that she felt she was doing good for mankind.
But it didn’t fly with the judge because she never apologized.
She never said, I’m sorry to the victims.
And there were hundreds of victims there.
And they had been outspoken, you know for years.
And, and I never understood it until this happened.
And I thought, wow, now I know what these people go through.
You’re really arguing something good there.
You’re, you’re training young, aspiring doctors.
You’re contributing to real medical research, and by and large, those programs are run really well.
And frankly, they often have an insufficient supply of bodies compared to what they need.
Now that’s my first piece of advice.
And you know that gets lost in the process.
That, that scrutiny of what actually is going to happen here.
And it’s possible for you to sign up in advance.
In fact, the body donation programs love that.
They know that they have a sort of a backlog.
That’s the opportunity to confirm you’ve made the right choice.
Now I’m not saying this happens everywhere.
It’s a very lucrative business.
Megan has made a lot of money selling these body parts and doing what she did.
We’re, we’re not going to get away with this anymore.
So I appreciate you, you know, helping to get the story out.
This story has nothing to do with lifesaving organ donations.
As for donating your body to science for research, that’s a little more complicated.
Body donation, as it is now, you have to sign up separately.
It does not mean they can do, take your body for body donation or anything else.
[00:46:06] Bob: It does seem like it would be easy to confuse those things.
They are two very distinct and separate programs.
And really that’s not ethically appropriate because these individuals are not consenting.
And it wasn’t until the 1950s to 1960s that this started to change.
And this is not just medical doctors, but also physical therapists, many people in the healthcare field.
This is a kind of a win-win situation because these individuals can contribute something after they’re dead.
[00:47:45] Thomas Champney: Right.
So that’s a really excellent question.
There’s a multiple reasons for that.
But beyond that, they get to see the variation in human form.
And so it’s valuable for students to appreciate that kind of normal variation that occurs.
They, they appreciate and approach death and dying.
This may be one of the first times they’ve seen a dead individual.
We also think this is really important because it, it allows them to develop some professional characteristics.
You know, how are you going to talk to patients?
How are you going to interact with uh, your colleagues.
[00:50:24] Bob: And most people will be surprised that almost anyone can participate in this marketplace.
[00:50:30] Thomas Champney: Very true.
[00:50:49] Bob: Virtually anyone can buy a body part.
That’s just shocking.
[00:52:14] Bob: For profit body brokers target people in hospice care.
That’s just shocking.
[00:52:24] Thomas Champney: Exactly.
That’s a really good point.
We encourage individuals to donate well before they’re, they’re sick or terminal or have any issues.
Many of our donors donate 10 or 15 years before they die.
We have these kind of legacy donations.
And as I said, we may be holding their paperwork for 10 or 15 years until they die.
We just don’t think that’s an ethically appropriate way to approach these individuals.
[00:53:29] Bob: It is also unethical to use economic circumstances to target people for body donation.
After all, funerals can be expensive.
People should donate their bodies to science because they want to, not because they have to.
[00:54:23] Bob: Do things have to be this way?
Why aren’t there better rules around body donation programs?
This is a, this is a not well regulated area.
And, and virtually all states have adopted them.
So that a much better organized system.
This is not allowable.
And we do not have that, that, anywhere near that level of regulation.
And that can be, that allows for these for-profit body brokers to, to grow and develop.
I think there should be some sort of accreditation process.
I mean we accredit accountants, right.
We accredit lots of other businesses, but this business has very little accreditation.
So I would like to see more regulatory mechanisms take place.
I, I would, I don’t want to do any of this.
Help, help ease their minds.
[00:57:11] Thomas Champney: Correct.
That’s a, a really good point as well.
That outcome still might be good.
[00:57:54] Thomas Champney: Yeah.
Many times they have a little donate box on their website that you could look at.
You could always call them.
Here’s Lois Greisman of the FTC.
[00:59:22] Bob: Why is it such a difficult and vulnerable time for consumers?
[00:59:25] Lois Greisman: It’s a highly emotional time.
They are preparing to say goodbye to their loved one.
And it’s incredibly stressful and also wrenching in many ways.
[00:59:42] Lois Greisman: That’s exactly right.
Can you talk to me about some of them?
[00:59:53] Lois Greisman: Sure.
And generally speaking, it’s not.
[01:01:35] Bob: That just all so, that just terribly sad.
[01:01:38] Lois Greisman: It is terribly sad, and it aggravates an already emotionally difficult situation.
[01:01:45] Bob: So how does the Funeral Rule protect consumers?
And why do some people feel it needs to be updated?
[01:01:52] Lois Greisman: This is rule that dates back to the early 1980s.
The record that the FTC had amassed was that people did not know how much funerals cost.
There’s not a posting of various fees and costs.
What does a limousine cost, what does a hearse cost?
Is embalming required or not?
Can you talk about that effort?
[01:03:53] Lois Greisman: Sure.
But this is a rule that dates back before the internet age.
And the rule does not currently require that prices be posted online.
[01:05:17] Lois Greisman: Yes, it’s generally referred to as Pre-Need.
And that is well, you’ve got the option to actually arrange for the funeral in advance.
What do you think about that?
[01:06:03] Lois Greisman: That’s a great idea.
And make choices at this incredibly difficult time.
Go online, see what you’ve got the option to find out.
They’re required to hand you a general price list.
They’re required to hand you price information on caskets.
If you don’t go in person, call them up.
Ask them for that price information.
These are purchases that cost thousands and thousands of dollars.
You do not want to go in debt.
Your loved one would not want you to go in debt.
Call the AARP Fraud Watch online grid Helpline at 877-908-3360.
Their trained fraud specialists can provide you with free support and guidance on what to do next.
Be sure to find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
For AARP’s The Perfect Scam, I’m Bob Sullivan.
The conviction of Megan Hess brings some needed closure to families devastated by her shocking betrayal of trust.
