Crime Weekly - S3 Ep145: Kouri Richins Found Guilty of Murder

Episode Date: March 25, 2026

On March 16, 2026, a Utah jury convicted Kouri Richins of murder in the fentanyl poisoning death of her husband Eric. Prosecutors alleged she spiked his Moscow Mule with nearly five times a lethal dose of fentanyl. The case gained attention after Richins wrote a children's book to help her young sons cope with their father's death, before being arrested for his murder. She faces 25 years to life in prison, with sentencing scheduled for May 13.Try our coffee! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.comBecome a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeeklyShop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shopYoutube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcastWebsite: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.comInstagram: @CrimeWeeklyPodTwitter: @CrimeWeeklyPodFacebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod

Booster juice is going crazy for hazelnuts. No, not crazy. Nuts. Booster juice is going bananas for hazelnuts. I mean, there are bananas and smoothies, but that's not the point. Banana juice is booster for hazelnuts. What? Just stop.

Booster juice is going nuts for hazelnut. Introducing the nutty monkey smoothie, holy hazelnut assay bowl and nutty booster ball. All made with rich, creamy hazelnut spread. Try them today. Only at booster juice. Canadian-born. blending since 1999. The Bell Air Direct app includes crash assist, which detects an accident the moment it happens,

and even offers you emergency assistance at the tap of a button. Okay, but what if I don't have an accident? Well, just keep on, keeping on. Bell Air Direct, insurance, simplified, conditions apply. Hey, everyone, welcome back to Crime Weekly News. I'm Derek Levasseer. And I'm Stephanie Harlow. And we're going to be talking about a case that we've covered before,

and it's making national headlines. when it originally happened. There were some back and forths about this case. Some people believed this person was innocent. I like to think more people believe she was guilty. And I'm talking about Corey Richens, if you didn't read the title of this episode. Who believed she was innocent?

There definitely was. So I had originally covered this on crime feed, if you remember. And then you were like, oh, did you hear about Corey Richens? I'm like, why does that sound so familiar? And I'm like, oh, we just covered it. And yeah, I'm with you. To me, the evidence was overwhelming. However, we're going to talk about the basic.

Stephanie's going to give you the rundown for anybody. You know what I think it was? I just read because basically what we're going to talk about is that she was found guilty by a jury. No. Yeah. Okay. One of the jurors who was on, I don't think it's called a panel, but she said she was, she and the other people on the jury were hoping that Corey was innocent, like hoping that she was.

And it only took three hours for them to come back, you know, to say that she was guilty of aggravated murder and the other charges. But I guess they like, I don't know why. Maybe they, obviously, Corey and her husband, Eric, who she was accused of killing, they had small children. So maybe the jurors were like, well, we, you know, they already lost their dad. We don't want to take their mom from them. This was a jury in Utah. So I don't know. Take that as you want. A case like this, when something occurs in your own backyard, it doesn't only affect the immediate people.

It affects the entire community because many people walk around believing stuff like this can't happen where they live, right? They hear it on the news or they watch it on a podcast and they think, oh, man, that's crazy. I'm glad I don't live there. And then it happens a street or two over and you're like, wow, even if it's not directly something you're connected to, it does still have an impact on you and your family members. and it causes some interesting dinner table conversations. But that's what I was going to say. We're going to talk about just the overview of what happened here, anybody who's not familiar with this case and what happened to Eric.

Yeah, and then you kind of just hit the nail on the head as far as jury members coming to a conclusion rather quickly, relatively speaking, how it goes in most cases, but also still in a way, which is interesting for them to admit this, but wanting to find her innocent, and wanting to acquit her and just not being able to do so with the overwhelming evidence. Because of the overwhelming evidence. Yeah, which is why when you're like people, some people thought you, I'm like, who? Who?

There were people. You have a whole jury of people who are like, we don't want to. They're going in biased, kind of. Like, we don't want to find her guilty. We want her to be innocent. And they still, after only three hours, had no other choice but to come back with a guilty verdict. And that's interesting.

I think it's, I think not even necessarily people believing she's innocent, but, thinking the evidence wasn't strong enough to find her guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. I think there's a big distinction there where you can believe the person's involved, but think that the evidence to support that is weak, right? We've seen that in many cases where someone is found innocent of a crime and we agree with it even though candidly we think they're guilty. You know, it's just not enough in the court of law to get there. So I do think there's a group of people who believe that she was involved,

but didn't believe the evidence was there to support it. But I also disagree with that notion as well. We can talk a little bit about the evidence, but I thought it was a slam dunk, to be honest. So for a quick overview, if anybody doesn't know this case, and it'll be very quick because I'm sure most people do. Eric Richens was found dead at the home he shared with his wife and children in Kansas. Cause of death was a fentanyl overdose, and toxicology later showed an extremely high level of fentanyl in his system about five times the lethal dose. Now, at first, the death was treated as suspicious, not immediately ruled a homicide. And then investigators later uncovered a series of details that raised serious concerns,

like the celebratory drink that Corey allegedly made Eric the night that he died. She made him a vodka Moscow mule. And then she claimed she went to bed and later found him unresponsive. And then prosecutors say that Corey had previously tried to poison Eric in the weeks earlier by spiking a sandwich. He had Ian. He reportedly did become very ill. He survived. And then we have, you know, the overwhelming motives. There's a lot of motives here. And that's kind of where it all comes in. So they still, and then the defense kind of rested heavily on this. They were like, hey, the prosecution, they still cannot show you how Eric Richens ingested that fentanyl. And so they haven't done their

job and now they want you to make inferences based on what they called paper thin evidence. This was Corey's legal team. But really, yes, was there a lot of circumstantial evidence? Yes. But they don't, they don't need. The prosecution doesn't need to show you how Eric consumed the fentanyl. And this was a case that really rested heavily on how much motive Corey had to have Eric, her husband, be dead. So, the prosecution focused a lot of their case on these many, many motives. And, you know, there was the fact that she was unhappy in her marriage. She was having an affair. We know that. She was also in huge financial debt. We can see that she was kind of running a real estate company and she was buying and selling things. But at the time that her husband died, Corey was in financial distress.

she had been like significantly going into debt and she needed a huge influx of cash and capital quickly. And so Eric's life had been insured for more than $2.2 million through several policies, one of which by the way, at least what they can prove so far is one of which Corey had applied for fraudulently. And then 10 days after that policy took effect, Corey attempted to kill Eric on Valentine's. Day. And then a month later, he was dead. So she wanted that insurance. And he was on to her, by the way. Yes, he was. He knew something was up. He was talking to his sister saying, if something happens to me, it's her. And so the jury unanimously agreed both the murder and attempted murder of Eric were committed for financial benefit, according to the verdict form. Yeah, the motive and the money were really,

I think, the most impactful thing for this jury. And that's why, you know, they want to go in and say, we don't want her to be guilty. A family's already ripped apart. But they looked at the money trail. They looked at the timing of everything. They looked at the fact that Corey was going to be in huge trouble if she didn't get money. And then they looked at the fact that, you know, Eric was insured for quite a bit and that money would have really helped her. And she was having an affair and talking about, you know, going away with this other guy. And it all kind of just didn't. It didn't look good. It's like who else wants Eric Richens dad as much as Corey, his own wife. No, there was a lot there. And this isn't a Corey Richens episode. You

and go back and kind of look at everything that we talked about in the episode when we covered it. I mean, there were so many things in addition to the failed attempt on Valentine's Day, or some people say a practice attempt, but there's a lot of digital evidence associated with this case, including her reaching out to someone who was like a housekeeper or a maid, someone who was at the house working for fentanyl. Yeah. For fentanyl. And that's who her supplier was. And then there's the digital evidence on the night in question of Eric's death where she

allegedly said that she had gone to bed and she was sleeping. and yet there's multiple pieces of data on her phone that show that she was not sleeping, that she was in her room awake. Even if you like open your phone and you don't send a text, it still shows in the log of that phone. Everything you're doing is being tracked down. Right. And Eric was his, his fentanyl levels were approximately five times.

Five times the fatal dose. And he didn't have a known history of opioid abuse. And they were able to determine that the fentanyl was ingested. shortly before his death. And it was ingested, not like, they couldn't find any drug paraphernalia, right? So it's not like he's injecting it. He's not taking, you know, pills, things like that. No evidence of him leaving the home or anybody else being inside the home.

So Occam's razor, right? Either he did it to himself or she poisoned him, period. And then when you take into consideration like you had talked about, the motive here where she was in a lot of financial debt, Eric had luck. removed her from the life insurance policies, but she had made multiple attempts to alter those policies. And one of the things that we talked about after his death was her finding out after he was already gone. That she'd been surprised. You've been removed, Corey. And I think I can't remember the details. She was trying to like drill into a safe. Yeah. Didn't, didn't we learn that she like punched

the sister? Yeah. Well, allegedly or like struck the sister in some way. But but she threw a party after Eric died. So there's people at the house. And this party was to celebrate, like, her buying this huge property that Eric hadn't wanted her to buy. And then so after Eric dies, she still has this party. And then the sister comes over. And the sister's like, what are you doing? And allegedly, Corey was trying to, like, get into this safe, like, drilling into this safe, trying to get into it.

And that's when the sister was like, well, you've been cut off anyways. So it doesn't matter. And Corey lost it. Got mad. and like allegedly struck her, yeah. Yeah. The Bell Air Direct app includes crash assist, which detects an accident the moment it happens

and even offers you emergency assistance at the tap of a button. Okay, but what if I don't have an accident? Well, just keep on keeping on. Bell Air Direct, insurance simplified. Conditions apply. Hey, Ontario. Come on down to BedMGM Casino and check out our newest exclusive.

The Price is Right Fortune Pick. Don't miss out. Play exciting casino games based on the iconic game show. Only at BedMGM. Access to the Price is Right Fortune Pick is only available at Bed MGM. MGM Casino. Bet MGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. 19 plus to wager, Ontario only. Please play responsibly.

If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connix Ontario at 1866-531-2,600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. And then on top of all of that, where it's kind of after the fact, but it may show a consciousness of guilt, which is something that is considered during the court proceedings. and that's the fact that after his death, she came out with this children's book called, Are You With Me?

And it's about dealing with grief. It's about a father who dies who comes back as like an angel to watch over his children. Yes. And she went on talk shows. Yes. And the jury members talked about this. Yeah.

They talked about it. And it's not only the fact that she tried to profit off of this murder, but it was also, in the prosecution's opinion, an attempt to control the narrative and to appear as a grieving widow, right to kind of get in front of it which is exactly what the jury said where it was like we saw her in the courtroom she just looked like a sad you know little woman and you know what if what if her husband did die and this has nothing to do with her what has she lost yeah no absolutely not i mean she also tried to delete stuff you know off of her phone so that's another consciousness of guilt thing like

and you think about reasonable doubt right like what other scenarios the only angle that they could go with here and i believe this is what cori's teams tried to go with which was that there was a dependency issue on Eric's behalf, where he had some problems with fentanyl use, or he may have used drugs in the past, and this was an unfortunate circumstance where while poor Corey was in bed, Eric used drugs,

and he accidentally overdosed, and there was just nothing to substantiate that. From what I knew, there, that he had never had a history of illicit drug use or addiction, but it was maybe in the past that he, allegedly according to the defense attorneys, Eric had been addicted to pain killers, specifically acid codeone, and he had requested his wife to procure them for him. I don't think that that

was ever proven necessarily. More this was something that Corey had alleged, because once again, she's the person who's being forced to get the painkillers for Eric. And maybe she tried to make that seem like that's why she was in communication with these drug dealers and things. and it wasn't a, you know, I'm not trying to get a murder weapon. My husband had a problem and an addiction. There is evidence that Eric had used THC gummies in the past to manage pain and things like that. But the addicted to painkiller thing, the opiates thing mainly came from the defense team. And there was body camera footage on the night of Eric's death where Corey is telling the police that her husband has no history of illicit drug use.

And she later tried to claim in a letter from jail that her husband gets high every night and he bought fentanyl from Mexico and all this stuff. But there's nothing to back that up. And if why didn't you say that to the police, right? When they showed up on the night he died. If they were like, does Eric have a history of illicit drug use? She could have been like, yeah, he's brought fentanyl from Mexico before and he pressured me to get painkillers. All that stuff once again only comes out after she's being accused of doing something wrong. Yeah, and I think some people have said, oh, the first attempt on Valentine's Day was just a, was a practice.

I disagree with that. No, I think it was an attempt. Yeah, it was a failed attempt where she was trying to do the smallest amount of fentanyl possible so that it would look like a natural occurrence where he was just, he was experimenting with drugs and it happened to be fentanyl inside the drugs. And yet, when it didn't work, she was like, okay, half the up, up the dose. And that's where she really screwed up, right? because she overshot, and it was five times the fatal amount. Which is nothing you'd ever see in recreational drugs that just have fentanyl least in them. That's way too much.

This was a deliberate poisoning where she wanted to make sure, okay, versus attempt didn't work. Yeah. Yeah. The job is done. And I think that's really what showed her cards in addition to a lot of other things. But you could make an argument with the motive as far as, listen, there's a lot of financial problems out there. If there's issues in the relationship, there could be some disagreements over life. insurance policies, et cetera, but couple that with everything else, including her reaching out

to someone for fentanyl, which happened to be the drug that killed her husband, you got a big hill to climb. It's not going to be an easy one to prove. And it's not her job to disprove the prosecution's theory on it, but they have to show some reasonable doubt to say, hey, listen, that's cool. That's their theory. But here's some other theories that could also have occurred. And ultimately, three hours, clearly the, the job.

jury wasn't buying it. A jury, which we've already said, was hoping she was innocent. So the ball was in her court. She had the odds in her favor. And yet as they watched her, and a couple jury members talked about it, she didn't really say anything during the trial. She just kind of sat there with no, they said it was tough to read her. Right. And overall, they deliberated and they said this wasn't something they took lightly. They really wanted to acquit her, but just the overwhelming amount of evidence didn't allow them to do so. There was nothing that was presented that would suggest reasonable doubt. There's also another interesting thing that just popped up a few days ago.

So it came out that the authorities who were investigating Eric Ritchin's death had found out through their investigation that Corey's mother, Lisa Darden, had been looked into in the 2006 death of a woman named Gertrude Moore, who was allegedly Corey's mother. mother's lover. And this woman had died from an overdose and was found foaming at the mouth. And this was 20 years before Eric Richens was fatally poisoned with fentanyl. And so they actually started looking into Corey's mother, whose name is Lisa Darden, because they were like, hey, the circumstances are similar enough here in Gertrude Moore's death that authorities investigate Lisa Darden with Detective Jeff O'Driscoll, noting in a search warrant, that the 66-year-old, Lisa, had been named as the beneficiary of her partner's estate a short time before her death.

So not only do we have similar circumstances as in, like, you know, a drug overdose that could be looked at as, you know, accidental but was actually intentional with some sort of financial benefit happening. It was kind of very suspicious. And O'Driscoll wrote in the warrant, quote, based on Lisa Darden's proximity to her partner's suspicious overdose death and her relationship with Corey, it is possible she was involved in planning and orchestrating Eric's death, end quote. So that's something interesting. That's kind of another twist here. I don't know if they've wrapped up this kind of potential investigation or if it's something that they're just maybe going to pursue further, but that's something to think about. That does seem to be a very similar sort of way to die with a similar motive. Yeah, this might just be the first domino to fall. Who knows. But overall,

We clearly believe that the jury got it right. It's unfortunate that it's after the fact and that we weren't able to prevent this from happening. But it is important to hold those accountable for their actions. And Corey can now write her second book behind bars. I'm sure she's going to appeal it as she has the right to do. And, you know, if there's a major update in the case, we will definitely let you guys know. We wanted to do just a quick update here because we covered the case. And whenever we spend any time on an investigation,

if there's an update, that's kind of what Crime Weekly news is for. So that's the update with Corey. If there's any other things that go on there, we'll let you know. We also, I was just watching on the news today as we're recording this on Monday. Last night we had an unfortunate circumstance where the Canadian Airlines flight flying into LaGuardia, I believe it was in your neck of the wood, Stephanie, had an accident on the runway with a fire truck. And unfortunately, the two pilots passed away and there were multiple firefighters injured as well. So we're thinking about everybody in that situation as well.

because we know right now there's some major issues going on with TSA and all this stuff. So, again, unfortunately with Crime Weekly News, we could do like a six-hour episode on all the things that just happened the week prior. But we try to stay consistent with what we've already covered on Crime Weekly News. So if there's anything out there that we're missing that you guys want to make us aware of, please weigh in down in the comments. Let us know. We will be back later this week with part two of Elisa Sherman. part one, you guys were very responsive to that. I hate to use the word like, but you guys really liked the first part, I think, because

there's a lot of mystery with it. I know for me, I was intrigued by it because it gets my wheels turning and it makes you think. It's not very obvious what happened here. So I'm looking forward to part two. We're going to record it right after we finish this. Glad Corey's behind bars. Yeah, of course.

Justice served. They don't always get it right. But in this one, we both believe they did, right? I don't think that there was ever, for me, there was no question. No doubt. Yeah. I was like, if a jury had found her not guilty. Crazy.

I would have protested. Okay, I would have been like, we need to move that venue. Get them out of Utah because these people are too nice or something. Yeah, it would have definitely been on a technicality. You need to try her in New York, okay? This would have been a 30-minute jury deliberation. No, I'm glad. I'm glad with the outcome and let us know what you guys think.

You know, listen, we're no judgment here, maybe a little bit of judgment. but do you think Corey was innocent or do you think that there wasn't enough evidence to convict her and you don't agree with the ruling? Maybe that's a way to frame it. So let us know what you think in the comments. Leave a review on Apple Podcasts on Spotify. One more thing that we want to cover here because we're still learning with the Patreon. We want to make sure we get all our partner in crime birthday shoutouts in. We had four more come in late.

If you're a partner and crime member, make sure you try to get it in at the beginning of the month. So that way we get all of you. But we got four more to go. Stephanie, you want to hit it? off. Yeah, so we have, and these are for March, these are still the March birthdays. We have Angel Man. Her birthday was March 12th, Pisces. Happy birthday, Angel. People love the Zodiac, they love it. They love it. They were commenting on it. Well, we have another Pisces. Natalie O'Shea, that's March 19th. Happy birthday, Natalie. And then we have two more Aries. We have Katie Schober,

March 26th. And then Penny. She didn't give a last name, but that's fine. Pretty Penny. March 23rd, Happy birthday to all our March birthday patrons. Other than that, everyone stay safe out there. We'll see you later this week.

Have a good night.