Woman who wrote book about grief to face trial for poisoning husband with fatal Moscow Mule cocktail

Kouri Richins, a Utah mother of three who wrote a children's book about coping with grief after her husband's death and was later accused of fatally poisoning him. Credit: AP

A children's author will stand trial after her husband died of fentanyl poisoning, a US judge has ruled.

Kouri Richins, 34, from Utah has been accused of fatally poisoning Eric Richins, 39, by adding fentanyl to a Moscow mule cocktail in March 2022. Prosecutors said the drink consumed by Mr Richins contained five times the lethal dose of the synthetic opioid.

The mother-of-three had insisted throughout the preliminary hearing that she is innocent and entered pleas of "not guilty" to all 11 counts against her.

Subscribe free to our weekly newsletter for exclusive and original coverage from ITV News. Direct to your inbox every Friday morning.

The incident is believed to have happened at their home in a small mountain town near Park City, east of Salt Lake City in Utah.

The second day of the preliminary hearing on Tuesday centered around an additional attempted murder charge that accused Richins of adding fentanyl to her husband's sandwich on February 14, 2022, triggering a severe but non-fatal reaction.

Ms Richins left the sandwich - thought to be her husband's favourite, purchased from a local diner - in the front seat of his truck with a note.

He then broke out in hives and blacked out, according to prosecutors.

Ms Richins had left to spend Valentine's Day with another man with whom she was having an affair, Summit County Prosecutor Brad Bloodworth said.

The following day she texted her lover, saying: “If he could just go away ... life would be so perfect.”

Witness statements and deleted messages recovered from the police suggest Ms Richins purchased the fentanyl pills from the family's housekeeper.

Carmen Lauber told police that Ms Richins subsequently asked her to procure stronger fentanyl, Detective Jeff O’Driscoll said on the first day of the hearing on Monday.

“She learned that putting it in a sandwich, where Eric Richins could take a bite, feel the effects, set the sandwich down, was not the proper way to administer a fatal dose of fentanyl,” Mr Bloodworth told the judge. “She learned that it takes a truckload to kill him."

Kouri Richins' trial is due to start on April 28. Credit: AP

Eric Richins had said over the phone that he believed he was poisoned, two friends of his said in a written statement, regarding the attempted sandwich poisoning.

After injecting himself with his son’s EpiPen and drinking an entire bottle of the allergy relief medicine Benadryl, he woke up from a deep sleep and told a friend: “I think my wife tried to poison me,” according to charging documents.

There were 17 days between the first alleged murder attempt and Eric Richins drinking the poisoned Moscow mule.

Days after Eric Richins drank the poisoned Moscow Mule his wife called emergency services in the middle of the night to report that she had found her husband "cold to the touch" at the foot of their bed, police reports said.

He was pronounced dead, and a medical examiner later found five times the lethal dosage of fentanyl in his system.

Defence attorneys Kathy Nester and Wendy Lewis argued that because police never found fentanyl in the Richins' home, detectives could not be certain that the drugs Kouri Richins bought from the housekeeper matched those found in Eric Richins' system.

“We firmly believe the charges against Kouri do not withstand thorough scrutiny and are confident that a jury will find the same,” they said in a joint statement.

Prosecutors said Kouri Richins mistakenly believed she would inherit her husband's estate under the terms of their prenuptial agreement and that she had taken out life insurance policies on him without his knowledge, totalling nearly $2 million (£1.5 million).

Court records indicated Eric Richins met an attorney in October 2020 to discuss the possibility of filing for divorce, which he never did, and to quietly cut his wife out of his will.

In the months before her arrest in May 2023, the Ms Richins self-published a children’s book titled “Are You with Me?” about a father with angel wings watching over his young son after dying.

The book could eventually play a key role for prosecutors in framing Eric Richins’ death as a calculated killing with an elaborate cover-up attempt.

Kouri Richins' trial is due to start on April 28.

Want a quick and expert briefing on the biggest news stories? Listen to our latest podcasts to find out What You Need To Know…