GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. — As Megan Hess and Shirley Koch held out their arms, the soft clink of metal handcuffs was audible in the federal courtroom.
And with that sound, dozens of victims let out gasps — hugging, crying and laughing at the conclusion Tuesday of a real-life body-snatching case that the judge acknowledged had little precedent in American history.
“We came today to hear the handcuffs click,” said Erin Smith, who brought her mother’s body to Sunset Mesa Funeral Directors in Montrose after her death in 2011. Seven years later, the FBI informed her family that her mother wasn’t cremated but instead dismembered and sold for profit.
U.S. District