A Utah judge handed down several rulings on Tuesday in the case of a grief author who is accused of murdering her husband with a fentanyl-laced cocktail.
Judge Richard Mrazik granted state prosecutor’s motion to dismiss two drug distribution charges against Kouri Richins, 34, ahead of her trial in April for allegedly murdering her husband Eric Richins, 39, ABC 4 reports.
He also agreed to try four charges of mortgage fraud and forgery separately from the murder charge.
But Mrazik went on to deny Richins bail for the second time on Tuesday – ruling that she presented a flight risk and a potential danger to herself and others, after her attorneys used certificates she earned in jail-run programs as evidence that the mother-of-four has been a model inmate since she was first detained in May 2023.
She is now facing charges of felony aggravated murder, attempted criminal homicide, and two counts of fraudulent insurance claims.
Prosecutors have argued that Richins slipped an obscene amount of drugs fentanyl into her husband’s Moscow Mule cocktail on March 3, 2023 amid financial disputes relating to their 10-acre $2million home.
They claimed that Eric had found out that his wife had taken out a $250,000 home equity line of credit and spent it, withdrawn $100,000 from his bank accounts, and spent more than $30,000 on his credit cards.
Kouri also stole about $134,000 from her husband’s business meant for tax payments, according to previously-filed court documents.
She even allegedly purchased four different life insurance policies, which totaled more than $1.9million between 2015 and 2017.
Yet, the couple still signed an agreement that would grant her the sale of the home prior to Eric’s death.
Then, just one day after Richins called police to report that she found her husband ‘cold to the touch’ at the foot of their bed, affidavits for search warrants showed that Kouri signed the closing papers on the couple’s home and invited friends for a party where she was drinking and celebrating.
Court documents further claimed that Kouri first attempted to kill her husband with a lethal dose of fentanyl just a month before she allegedly served him the spiked cocktail.
Prosecutors have alleged that a sandwich that she got for him on Valentine’s Day was left with a note in the front seat of his truck.
Following his death, Kouri also benefitted financially after she wrote a children’s book about grief.
She said in an interview that she was motivated to write the book after searching Amazon and Barnes and Noble and finding ‘nothing’ to help her sons ‘cope’ and dedicated the book to Eric.
Kouri promoted it on television and radio, describing the book as a way to help children grieve the loss of a loved one.
Attorneys for Richins have since tried to get Mrazik to separate charges of attempted criminal homicide, two counts of mortgage fraud and two counts of forgery from the charges related to Eric’s murder.
They argued her alleged attempt to poison her husband on February 14 and the day of his death on March 3, 2023 did not meet the definition of a ‘single criminal episode,’ and therefore should be tried separately.
‘The prejudice that Mrs. Richins will face if the jurors are allowed to consider two separate alleged acts involving an alleged intent to cause death cannot be overstated,’ the defense team argued in a motion last week, according to ABC 4.
‘The fact that allegations connected to February 14 are wholly speculative and circumstantial makes the prejudice to Mrs. Richins even more profound.’
But state prosecutors argued against severing the charges, saying they are all connected as part of a ‘common scheme or plan’ of criminal activity – claiming Richins went from alleged fraud over her property to eventually take her husband’s life.
‘The evidence supporting each of the offenses establishes a really discernable, direct relationship between all nine offenses,’ they argued.
‘Considering the offenses together, the defendant’s parasitic behavior forms an arc of increasingly aggressive, risky, opportunistic and bold actions required to perpetuate the defendant’s façade of accomplishment and success.’
In the end, Mrazik ruled that the alleged attempted homicide on February 14 came just 17 days before Eric’s untimely death – and in both instances there were text messages allegedly indicating Kouri obtained fentanyl, gave him food or drink and fled the scene.
But he said, due to possible unfair prejudice, the four counts of mortgage fraud and forgery that allegedly occurred in 2021 will be tried separately.
‘There is too much temporal distance and too much dissimilarity,’ the judge said, KSL-TV reports.
The defense attorneys had also sought to get Mrazik to reconsider his denial of Richins’ bail, arguing that the fact that she is no longer facing the death penalty – in addition to the dismissal of the two drug counts – provides an opportunity for a renewed discussion on her release.
In court, attorney Kathy Nester characterized the mother-of-four as a ‘bright, engaged, curious woman’ who wants to be involved in her case, the Park Record reports.
‘As a mother, there is no way Kouri Richins is leaving her children, no matter what they’re being told… She would never leave her children,’ Nester told the judge.
She went on to argue that Richins does not have the means to move somewhere else.
‘She literally has no resources to leave the country, to resettle in another place. She would have no ability to support herself,’ Nester said, urging the judge to let Richins go free and impose measures such as an ankle monitor or house arrest.
But Mrazik said with the loss of her connections to the community over the past year, as her children are under the guardianship of her husband’s family and her business is gone, there is nothing tying her down as she faces a possible sentence of life in prison.
He commended her for using her time in jail ‘as productively as possible,’ but said that her the possibility she could die in prison ‘creates a powerful incentive for [Richins] to harm herself of witnesses in this case and to flee the jurisdiction of the court’ if she were to be released on bail, Fox 13 reports.
As Mrazik handed down the ruling, members of Richins family embraced and gave each other reassuring hand squeezes.
Still, Nester expressed hope in her client’s case.
‘With two charges dismissed and four others severed, the defense stands more confident,’ she said as she left court on Tuesday.
‘The case against our client is rapidly narrowing, exposing deeper weaknesses with each step.
