A year after her husband passed away, a mother of three in Utah self-published a children’s book that she claimed helped her sons deal with the sudden loss. She promoted her book “Are You With Me?” on a local TV station and received praise for assisting young children in processing the death of a parent.
Weeks after the book was released in 2023, she was arrested in connection with her husband’s death and charged with murder.
The arrest sent waves of shock through her small mountain town just outside Park City, where a 12-person jury is set to decide her fate in a trial that begins Monday.
Richins, 35, faces nearly three dozen charges related to her husband’s death, including aggravated murder, attempted murder, forgery, mortgage fraud, and insurance fraud. She has pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors assert that she killed her husband, Eric Richins, at their home in March 2022 by slipping fentanyl into a drink he consumed. They claim she was deeply in debt and killed him for financial gain while planning a future with another man she was having an affair with.
The chilling case of a once-respected local author accused of profiting from her own violent crime has fascinated true-crime enthusiasts since her arrest. What was once lauded as a touching read has since become a tool for prosecutors to argue she carried out a calculated killing.
Her defense attorneys, Wendy Lewis, Kathy Nester, and Alex Ramos, stated they are confident the jury will rule in Richins’ favor after hearing her side of the story.
“Kouri has waited nearly three years for this moment: the opportunity to have the facts of this case heard by a jury, free from the prosecution’s narrative that has dominated headlines since her arrest,” her legal team said in a statement. “What the public has been told bears little resemblance to the truth.”
Documents allege two poisonings
According to the police report, on the night of her husband’s death, Richins called 911 to report finding him “cold to the touch” at the foot of their bed. He was pronounced dead, and a medical examiner later found five times the lethal dose of fentanyl in his system.
Charging documents allege that was the first poisoning.
A month earlier, on Valentine’s Day, Eric Richins told friends he developed hives and fainted after taking one bite of a sandwich Richins had prepared for him. The week police say she also bought fentanyl pills from the family’s housekeeper, she had purchased the sandwich. Opioids, including fentanyl, can trigger severe allergic reactions.
After injecting himself with his son’s EpiPen and downing the allergy medication Benadryl, Eric Richins woke from a deep slumber and called a friend, stating, “I think my wife tried to poison me,” the friend recounted in a written statement.
A day after Valentine’s Day, Kouri Richins texted her alleged lover, “If he could just disappear… life would be so perfect.”
Key witnesses
The friend Eric Richins called that night and the housekeeper who claims to have sold his wife the drugs could be key witnesses in the upcoming trial. Others may include family members and the man Kouri Richins was allegedly having an affair with.
The prosecution’s star witness, housekeeper Carmen Lauber, told police she gave Richins fentanyl pills she bought from a dealer a few days before Valentine’s Day. According to charging documents, later that month, Richins allegedly told the housekeeper the pills weren’t strong enough and asked her to obtain stronger fentanyl.
Defense attorneys are expected to argue that Lauber did not actually give Richins fentanyl and was motivated to lie for legal protection. Lauber is not facing charges related to the case, and detectives said at an earlier hearing she had been granted immunity.
No fentanyl pills were ever found in Richins’ home, and the housekeeper’s dealer said he was in jail and detoxing from drug use when he told detectives in 2023 he sold Lauber fentanyl. He later stated in a sworn affidavit he only sold her the opioid OxyContin.
Money as motivation
Charging documents show Eric Richins met with a divorce attorney and an estate planner in October 2020, a month after he discovered his wife made some major financial decisions without his knowledge. Court documents state she had a negative bank account balance, owed lenders over $1.8 million, and was being sued by a creditor.
Prosecutors claim Kouri Richins mistakenly believed she would inherit her husband’s estate under their prenuptial agreement. They allege she also opened numerous life insurance policies on her husband without his knowledge, with benefits totaling nearly $2 million.
She is also accused of forging loan applications and fraudulently claiming insurance benefits after her husband’s death.