Judge rules that Kouri Richins, Utah mother accused of fatally poisoning her husband, will stand trial

A Utah mother of three who published a children's book about grief following the death of her husband and was later accused of fatally poisoning him must stand trial, a judge ruled Tuesday.

Utah State Judge Richard Mrazik ruled on the second day of the Kouri Richins' After the preliminary hearing, the prosecution had presented enough evidence against her to initiate a jury trial.

Richins faces a number of charges related to allegedly killed her husband with a fatal dose of fentanyl in March 2022 at her home in a small mountain town near Park City. Prosecutors say Kouri Richins, 34, mixed five times the lethal dose of the synthetic opioid into a Moscow Mule cocktail that Eric Richins, 39, drank.

Richins continues to maintain her innocence. On Tuesday, she pleaded not guilty to all eleven charges.

The second morning of her preliminary hearing focused on another attempted murder charge filed in March. She was accused of slipping fentanyl into her husband's favorite sandwich on Valentine's Day, causing a severe but non-fatal reaction.

Summit County Prosecutor Brad Bloodworth defended the prosecution by saying that he believed Richins had learned lessons from the first failed assassination attempt on her husband that helped her carry out the murder 17 days later.

A bite of his favorite sandwich — which he left on the front seat of his truck along with a note on Valentine's Day — caused Eric Richins to break out in a rash and faint, prosecutors allege. His wife had bought the sandwich at a local diner in the town of Kamas, two days after she also bought fentanyl pills from the family's housekeeper, according to witness statements and deleted text messages found by police.

Text messages and location data suggest that Kouri Richins may have brought the sandwich homethen she left to spend Valentine's Day with another man with whom she was having an affair, Bloodworth said. The day after Valentine's Day, she texted her lover: “If he could just go away… life would be so perfect.”

In written statements, two of Eric Richins' friends recounted phone conversations on the day prosecutors say he was first poisoned by his wife of nine years. After injecting himself with his son's EpiPen and drinking a bottle of Benadryl, he awoke from a deep sleep and told a friend, “I think my wife tried to poison me,” charging documents say.

Housekeeper Carmen Lauber told police that Kouri Richins then asked her to get stronger fentanyl, Detective Jeff O'Driscoll said this on the first day of the hearing on Monday.

“She learned that putting it in a sandwich where Eric Richins can take a bite, feel the effects and put the sandwich back down is not the right way to kill him,” Bloodworth told the judge. “She learned that it takes a whole truckload of fentanyl to kill him.”

Days later, Kouri Richins called 911 in the middle of the night to report finding her husband “cold” at the foot of her bed, according to the police report. He was pronounced dead and a medical examiner later found a lethal dose of fentanyl in his system, five times the fatal dose.

In the months leading up to her arrest in May 2023 the Utah mother Of the three, he self-published the children's book “Are You With Me?” about a father with angel wings who watches over his deceased little son.

The book could ultimately play a key role in helping the prosecution portray Eric Richins' death as a premeditated murder with an elaborate cover-up. The judge has scheduled a preliminary hearing for September 23, at which the prosecution and defense will discuss jury selection. A trial date has not yet been set.