Dateline NBC - Page Turner

Episode Date: September 26, 2023

Andrea Canning reports on the ongoing case of a Utah mother of three who wrote a children’s book about coping with grief following the sudden death of her husband.

The first thing I thought when I heard this story was, this is going to be on Dateline. Tonight on Dateline. She called 911 and reported that her husband was cold to the touch, not breathing. They were saying that he passed away. Did he have a heart attack? Did he have a stroke during the night? I heard it was a brain aneurysm. Corey said, I am a grieving widow. She wrote what she believed to be the first book for kids on

coping with grief. A couple months later, we're hearing overdose and it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, what's going on here? He had five times the lethal amount of fentanyl in his system. This is a husband keeping a big secret from his wife. Very big secret. According to Amy, things got intense. Right, it got physical. There is an anonymous message, and all it says in capital letters, she killed her husband.

I just got chills when you said that. There's so many layers to it that are horrifying. A young widow wrote the book on grief, but was she grieving or scheming? I'm Lester Holt, and this is Dateline. Here's Andrea Canning with Page-Turner. In the shadow of Park City, Utah, a playground for the rich and famous, sits tranquil Camas Valley, the perfect place to raise a family. And by all appearances, the Richens family, Eric, Corey, and their three boys,

had a picture-perfect life there. Until suddenly, tragedy struck in the middle of the night. At just 39 years old, Eric was found dead in his home. Soon, a family's private tragedy would become public when Corey chose a unique way to grieve. She wrote a children's book and went on a TV show called Good Things Utah. My kids and I kind of wrote this book on the different emotions and grieving processes that we've experienced last year. Corey told the hosts it was a way to cope and pay it forward.

What happened next was so unbelievable, it seemed everyone was talking about it. We want to turn out of the murder case out of Utah. There's new developments in that case in Utah. It's a story of secrets, lies, and money. This whole case just has so many nuances and so many twists and turns, you couldn't make it up. But that's why truth is sometimes stranger than fiction. And it's not over yet.

The story of Eric and Corey began in the most unlikely of places, the Home Depot in Park City, Utah. Linda King was there when it all began. Tell us about Corey. What was she like? Corey was the sweetest girl. I mean, really, the sweetest girl. She had one register, and I had the other register, and I was the mom down there, you know. She was darling, sociable, just nice, cute, bubbly, very smart. Were the guys interested in Corrie then? Almost every one of them were. And Cor Corey was a younger girl. You know how

guys can get. Sometimes Mama Bear Linda had to intervene. Sometimes she'd get a little scared, you know, so I'd have to walk over there and tell him, come on over to my register and deal with Mama over here. But there was one customer that Linda approved of, Eric Richens, a partner in a thriving stonework business. Was it obvious to you how successful Eric was? You know, he didn't act like a big shot like some of these guys, you know. He was just Eric. Why did you like him so much?

Because he loved me. He was so funny. He had the laugh. I'm going to go. The laugh. Yeah. When it came to Corey, though, he was a little shy. His employees would come in and just say, oh, God, you know, Eric really, really likes her. And are you telling Corey?

Yes, and Corey's going, oh, my God. She goes, I like him. One day, the stars aligned with a little nudge from Linda. One of the guys come in, and he just comes in cracking up. He goes, oh yeah, he's out in the truck. He's just afraid to come in. And I said, tell him to get in here right now. Eric did as he was told. He came into the store and asked Corey for her number. And it didn't take very long and they were going out on a date. This is like out of a rom-com, you know, meeting at Home Depot. Oh, yeah.

And it played out like one, too. One day, Corey came to Linda and said Eric popped the question. She was very excited. She got her dream man, Eric. What did you say to Eric? I just told him, good job. Things moved quickly for Corey and Eric. Before they even had a chance to walk down the aisle, a baby boy was on the way.

Corey's future in-laws hosted the baby shower. Linda remembers it was a beautiful day. It was a fun time, you know, a new little baby for Eric, a little boy, and everybody was just really happy about it. Welcoming Corey to the family? Corey, yes. It was just, I thought it was perfect. Eric and Corey's baby boy arrived in July of 2012. After the baby was born, she would come into Home Depot, her and her mother, and she'd have the baby in the stroller and just all decked out, you know, looking so cute. She was so proud of him. About a year later, Corey and Eric tied the knot in the backyard of their new five-bedroom house.

Then, two more boys came along. Corey was a stay-at-home mom, and Eric was all-in as a dad. Local diner owner Gabe Morin knew Eric as a friend and a t-ball coach to his son. At five years old, you're herding cats. Oh, I know all about that. There's not a whole lot of system to the madness. Gabe said Eric was calm under pressure, whether with the little ones or occasionally rescuing friends who got stuck out in the snow snowmobiling. The day that really

sticks in my mind was waist deep powder. And our friend Bob got stuck. And, you know, we call the radio, hey, we got us stuck. Eric's right there. Since he's such a good rider, is he stopping to help everyone? Absolutely. Is he that kind of guy? Absolutely. Eric's business was growing as new developments popped up

and Corey decided to get in on the action. She hired a nanny and started up her own business, Flipping Houses. I knew she was very smart. You could tell a person's very smart. I knew she was very smart. You could tell a person's very smart. I know she liked real estate. She was wonderful. Val Maynard sold Corey his fixer-upper. He said she transformed it. Looking at the finished house, did you feel like you were in an episode on HGTV? It did. It did a lot. It seemed it was paradise in Camas Valley for Corey and Eric. That is until March 4th, 2022,

when a 911 call came into Summit County Emergency Services a little after 3 a.m. It was sad, shocking, and the beginning of an investigation that would lead to some very dark and surprising places. This would be categorized as a suspicious death. A few hours before sunrise on a cold winter's morning, mom of three, Corey Richens, was on the phone with emergency dispatchers. She said she found her husband, Eric, in their bed, unresponsive. He was cold to the touch, not breathing.

Former FBI Special Agent Pam Flick is a Dateline consultant who studied the case for us. When she's on the phone with the operator, they instruct her to take him off the bed and begin CPR. Paramedics quickly arrived to find Eric on the floor. They tried their best to save him, but he was gone. I mean, young men in their 30s who are not sick don't generally drop dead in their bed. No.

This just isn't normal. A sheriff's deputy headed to the house too, even though there were no obvious signs of foul play. There's no gunshot wound or needle marks or a vial, nothing. There's nothing to tell them anything. The deputy asked Corey to put down on paper what she could remember about the night before. She wrote, Eric and I put the kids to bed at around 9 p.m. We had a drink around 9.15 p.m. They were celebrating a new business venture Corey was involved in. She said Eric had sipped a Moscow Mule.

Corey said they were in bed between 9.30 and 9.45 p.m. But then very quickly after, she got up to take care of one of her children that was having a nightmare. So I went to sleep in his bed. My husband and I said, good night, I love you. And she didn't come back into the bedroom until about 3 o'clock that morning.

And that's when things, she says, go terribly wrong. Right. Corey continued on. I got in our bed and went to hug, cud says, go terribly wrong. Right. Corey continued on. I got in our bed and went to hug, cuddle Eric, and he was freezing. I put a blanket on him, then gently pushed him and said Eric, but he didn't respond, and his body was heavy. A weird feeling. I knew something was wrong.

And she also seems like she's in disbelief. Yes. The deputy asked Corey whether Eric had any medical conditions. Corey said Eric had Lyme disease, but no other major health issues. She's explaining that he's a healthy 39-year-old man. He never does drugs. He doesn't do any illicit drugs. He had an allergy shot the day before, was kind of complaining of chest, of his chest hurting.

But other than that, he's healthy. Corey also mentioned this to the deputy. Sometimes he'll eat a gummy before he goes to bed. It didn't seem like he did, though. The deputy asked for clarification. So like a gummy, as in like a THC gummy? Uh-huh, said Corey. This would be categorized as a suspicious death. What they need most of all is the body going to the morgue, and that's going to tell a tale. Uh-huh, said Corey. This would be categorized as a suspicious death. What they need most of all is the body going to the morgue, and that's going to tell a tale. So Eric's body went off to the medical examiner for an autopsy and toxicology tests. Word quickly spread around tight-knit Camas Valley. The breakfast rush was on at the Mirror Lake Diner when owner Gabe Morin heard the news about his friend.

You saw Eric the day before he died? Yeah, that morning he came in and had his chicken fried steak. We chatted for a bit. Everything was normal. How did he look physically to you when he was here? Yeah, healthy, normal. He didn't seem sick at all? No. Pale, nothing out of the ordinary?

No. I got the call the next morning and had to tell my friends what I found out. It hits home when you're talking to someone today and then tomorrow you're breaking bad news. Gabe at first heard that Eric died peacefully in his sleep. And then a few weeks later, you know, I heard a brain aneurysm. Eric and Corey's friend, Linda King, heard the same. Oh my God, he's so young. Linda and Gabe joined hundreds of other mourners at Eric's funeral. There were a lot of tears. It was very heartbreaking. You know, this is, wait a minute, this is a neighbor, this is someone we know and care about.

And if one of those neighbors dies... Yeah, the community will show up for it. Now she's a single mom who has to raise... Raise these boys, and oh my God, how is she going to do this? You know, just things like that, it's just sad. Eric and Corey seem to have it all. But now, Eric was gone, and three little boys were missing their father. Corey said she struggled to get them through their grief,

especially at night. And then she came up with an idea. This is the most surreal thing that has happened in my career so far, and I don't know that anything will ever surpass this. March of this year marked the one-year anniversary of Eric Richens' death. His wife, Corey, now a single mom, left to pick up the pieces for their three young boys. I lost my dad when I was 20. For these kids to lose their dad at, what, seven years old, ten years old, I mean, that's crazy. That's terrible. And that's why Corey came up with an idea to help her sons through their grief.

A book, she said, they wrote together called Are You With Me? Her mom popped up on Facebook and showed a picture of the book. And she says, oh, it's on Amazon. And I thought, oh, my God, I'm going to buy that book, you know. Did you think it was sweet that she was doing that for her boys? Oh, yes. Yeah, I did. I thought so. We get this email, and it's Corey Richens saying that she wrote a children's book, and it's what she believed to be the first

book for kids on coping with grief. Dina Manzanaris is one of the hosts of Good Things Utah on KTVX in Salt Lake City. Corey's book and the story behind it seemed to Dina like a perfect fit for the show. I think what was appealing is that she was a grieving mother who was in her 30s raising three small kids. Myself and the co-hosts on the show are all moms with children. We all have empathy for other mothers. And we see that come in and we think, oh, how horrible, how hard. Here she is trying to cope.

A very compelling story that could potentially help other people. Right. So my husband passed away unexpectedly last year. And that's how Corey ended up on the set of Good Things Utah earlier this year. You know, I just watched the struggle that my kids were going through. And said, nighttime is now the hardest for my boys, myself and my three little boys. Corey said she had looked for a book that might help comfort her sons but couldn't find one. So she got to work. She dedicated the book to her amazing husband and a wonderful father.

It's about a little boy who has lost his dad. And as he's going through his life, going to school, going on different adventures, he's wondering if his dad is still there. And they're trying to keep that memory a part of his life every day. In the book, the dad is still there, but he appears as an angel who's watching over his son. Yeah, the dad is deceased in the book. He's the guardian angel.

Corey's five-minute segment wrapped, and the two chatted for a few minutes afterwards. That's when Corey shared with Dina the circumstances of how her husband died. She said, my husband passed away from COVID and he had a lung issue. COVID? The story around town was that Eric had died of a brain aneurysm. Anyway, Corey left the studio and that was that. Until things took an unexpected turn. Someone who'd watched Corey's interview reached out to the station with a stunning allegation. So I come into work the next day, get on my computer, checking my emails, and there is an anonymous message that's come in

to the entire station. To every single person at the station? Yes. The subject line was, are you with me? The name of Corey's book. I open it up and all it says in capital letters and many exclamation points is, you know she killed her husband. I mean, this is creepy. This is the moment where things get just so surreal. It was definitely creepy. It was definitely weird, but we didn't really give it another thought after the initial whoa.

But a week later... I checked my Facebook inbox, and it's somebody that I don't know, and the profile picture doesn't have a person on it, and it had like a landscape, so I don't know who it is. And it said, you need to investigate your children's book author. Did you know that she is a suspect in the murder of her husband? The plot thickens. Yes. I'm like, this is weird. Like something's up with this. I'm definitely now on alert. Dina didn't know what to make of these ominous messages about the children's book author. She and so many others were still in the dark about how Eric died. But law enforcement wasn't. They'd known for a year.

Autopsy results showed it wasn't COVID or a brain aneurysm. Eric's cause of death was fentanyl poisoning. He had five times the lethal amount of fentanyl in his system. The toxicology report brings the investigation into a whole new light. How would he have gotten this fentanyl in his system. The toxicology report brings the investigation into a whole new light. How would he have gotten this fentanyl? That's what detectives wanted to know. What was really going on in Eric and Corey's life together?

What they found was a marriage full of secrets, secrets they were keeping from each other. It was a mystery. Eric Richens was poisoned by fentanyl, a lot of it. And for the people who knew and loved him, it didn't make any sense. Eric wasn't a drug addict. I know drug addicts. I've seen drug addicts. We're hearing fentanyl and overdose, and it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, what's going on here? That's the last thing you'd expect with Eric. After detectives got the toxicology report back,

they got a warrant to search Corey and Eric's house, but didn't find anything that pointed to drug use. That seems really odd that you would find no drugs in the bedroom. No syringe or bottle or pills or... Nothing. It's very interesting that there was nothing found. Since the search didn't reveal anything about how Eric ingested a fatal dose of fentanyl, investigators had to look elsewhere.

So they started to dig deep into their lives. The detectives learned that Corey and Eric lived well. They took a lot of vacations, owned a lot of expensive toys like snowmobiles and four-wheelers. Eric was the breadwinner. His family said he earned around a million dollars a year. On the other hand, Corey's house- business was in big trouble, according to a forensic

accountant who looked into her finances and provided what she found to the Summit County DA's office. Alec and Taryn Wright wish they had known more about Corey's business before they bought their house. In 2020, the Wrights bought this newly renovated four-bedroom house on a corner lot in Heber City, Utah. The house had been flipped by Corey Richens, though they never dealt with her directly. It seemed like a great place to raise their two young kids. Did you imagine summers with those sunsets, a lifetime of looking out at that beautiful landscape? Yeah, we did. The back of the house faces a very well-known mountain range, Timpanogos.

We envisioned having barbecues and hosting and just spending time with family and being able to look out at that beautiful view. But their joy in the house was short-lived. We were constantly going to the doctor. The Wrights said they were sick all the time. Taryn, pregnant with her third child, was in and out of the hospital. Their daughter developed asthma and complained of joint pain.

Their son was strangely regressing in school. He couldn't retain information. He was struggling to function. Doctors couldn't figure out why. And as the family's health was falling apart, so it seemed was their house. One day, Taryn says she pushed her son's dresser away from the wall. She stepped into a puddle of water and saw mold. And that's when we noticed it growing out of the walls. Oh my gosh.

Yes. The Wrights hired an expert to check the mold. Tests ultimately revealed extremely high levels of it in the house. So the decision to leave the house for good all happened in a matter of like a day? Yes. We were like, we need to get out. This is, everything kind of had led up to that point. The Wrights felt they had to move out quickly.

Wanting to learn more about their house, Taryn tracked down the person who sold it to Corey, Val Maynard. Remember him? Val had been impressed when he first saw Corey's renovation, especially since the house had big problems. He says he warned Corey and her colleague about them. I showed him the really bad bathroom we hadn't used for about a year or so downstairs what was wrong with the bathroom i had lots of

water damage what did cory say to you when she when you showed her all of these issues i don't know if it was her or the guy that was with her i said i've've seen worse. The Wrights said none of these problems were disclosed to them when they bought the house. We had no knowledge of any water damage, any mold issues, any roof issues, any plumbing issues. I'm thinking to myself, man, I thought she was a good person, a person that I could trust. I mean, I was totally fooled. The Wrights feel the same way. Did you feel like you'd been taken? Oh, yeah. Very much so, yes.

They're suing Corey for fraud and breach of contract. They hope they'll get some money to repair or perhaps rebuild their dream home. Corey has denied all the allegations in the lawsuit. For now, the house sits empty. I can't wrap my mind around how she sleeps at night. Like, I don't know how you go around destroying people's lives and you just have no regard to it. This is the last thing that I wanted to bring upon my family.

Wouldn't wish this on anyone else. After selling that house to the Wrights, Corey continued to expand her business. She was buying homes, taking out high-interest loans and struggling to pay them back, according to the forensic accountant. Corey was also dipping into Eric's personal and business funds, according to the Summit County DA's office. She was running up credit cards on his accounts. And the DA's office says there was more. She used a fraudulent power of attorney to take out a $250,000 line of credit using their home as collateral. The DA's office concluded Eric

didn't know what Corey was up to with the credit cards, the line of credit, the power of attorney, or that there was something else Corey had done. She'd taken out at least five life insurance policies in Eric's name without his knowledge. Corey's attorney denies the accusations. The lawyer says Eric even got a medical exam for one of those policies. Now, with Eric gone, this young widow knew there was something important in her husband's safe, and she wanted to get her hands on it. When she went to open it, that's when matters came to a head. It's at this very moment that a bombshell is essentially dropped on Corey. It was early March 2022, just days after Eric had died.

Corey had called a locksmith to open a safe he kept in their garage. But Eric's sister Amy was there that day, and she told Corey, not so fast. That safe wasn't hers. Amy approaches her and essentially tells Corey, you have no right to any of Eric's property. You don't even have this house. Corey may have been keeping financial secrets from her husband, but it turns out Eric was hiding things too. Investigators were told that in September of 2020, Eric found out some of his

bank and credit accounts had been frozen because Corey had misused his funds. That got him worried. Richens' family spokesperson, Greg Skordas. Eric decided to do something secretly himself to remedy the situation or to prepare for the future. To cover his boys. So Eric met with a lawyer to draft a new estate plan. Corey wouldn't get much of anything and wasn't told a thing about it. The attorney who helped Eric told the DA's office Eric was worried Corey would find out what he was doing. In fact, he told the lawyer, don't email or leave me a message. Get in touch with my sister Katie if you need me. He put Katie in charge of his estate if he died. Eric also met with a divorce attorney, but nothing came of it. He stayed with Corey.

Do you get the sense from talking to the family, hearing everything you've heard, that despite all the bad things that were happening in the marriage, Eric still felt like, I can handle this. I'm taking care of this. That's kind of the person that he was, that I can take care of this.

I mean, that's what he did. His business, his being a father, his being a big brother, was, I got this. The day Corey called the locksmith was the first she'd heard anything about Eric putting his sister Katie in charge of his estate. Eric's sister Amy told investigators that Corey was outraged. According to Amy, Corey did not take this well, lashed out at Amy, and things got intense. Right. It got physical. Amy said Corey punched her in the face. Corey said it was just a push. Eric's family had big concerns about their brother's widow and let investigators know it. How seriously would you take that as an investigator if the family's telling you

how Corey's behaving so soon after her husband's death? It is extremely suspicious and as an investigator I would be extremely interested in what the family had to say. Here's something chilling. Eric wasn't just worried about money. His family told investigators he was afraid for his life. He said this, very prophetic. If something happens to me, if I die, you should look closely at Corey's conduct.

So that's almost like him speaking from the grave now. Right. In fact, Eric's sister told investigators that Eric thought Corey tried to poison him before. Corey, through her attorney, says that never happened. True or not, now detectives believed that's exactly what Corey did the night he died. Perhaps dosing that Moscow mule with fentanyl. If she's guilty of this, then she would have had to buy this fentanyl from someone,

which could potentially leave a trail of breadcrumbs. Correct? Investigators believe they'd located those breadcrumbs in Corey's phone records. They noticed Corey had deleted text messages between herself and a woman named Carmen Lauber. Carmen worked for Corey cleaning houses. She also had a history of drug abuse. She's been in and out of the legal system in regard to drug addiction and drug distribution. In fact, this past April, she was arrested on drug charges and went to jail.

That's where investigators in Corey's case interviewed her several times. She told them that Corey asked her to get fentanyl, and she did, more than once. Carmen said one time she got Corey drugs, Corey paid her with this $1,300 check. Detectives say witnesses and phone records corroborate Carmen's story. So to investigators, it appears she's telling the truth. And there was more. Detectives learned about the mansion. This unfinished 20,000 square foot mansion that sits on 10 acres at the base of the Wasatch Mountains was one of the properties Corey wanted to flip. But that would cost millions of dollars and apparently it was a big source of contention between Corey and Eric.

Remember, Corey said the night Eric died, they were celebrating a new business venture. It was the purchase of this house. Family told investigators that Eric didn't want to buy it. You don't believe they were celebrating the mansion, or at least that Eric was celebrating the mansion? I don't believe that. No. Corey met with a notary the day after Eric died to close the deal.

The timing of that is extremely suspicious. One would think, look, everyone grieves differently. But I can't imagine that that would be on my mind the day after my husband died, that I have to go officially make this mansion my own. It's extremely concerning. We don't know how much Corey knew about the investigation that followed Eric's death, but back in April, just two weeks after her TV appearance,

she sent this email to detectives in order to, she said, clarify a few things. She was saying that Eric and I had no financial issues, that we were in a good place in our marriage, that there was no issues with anything. She wrote, I just want this over. I just want our lives back and to move on and to grieve and mourn my husband without looking over my shoulder constantly for you guys. She's like almost willing it to go away. Yeah. With her words. Exactly. Whatever she was doing, it didn't work.

Just two and a half weeks after that email, on May 8th of this year, Corey Richens was arrested and charged with aggravated murder and drug possession with intent to distribute and put behind bars. Corey's arrested. Yes. It's horrible. It's horrible. I just kept on thinking, she couldn't do that. She wouldn't do that. But the more I hear, it just makes me sick to my stomach.

News of Corey's arrest did not stay local for long. Suddenly, the story of the grieving mother turned alleged killer who wrote a book to help her sons was everywhere. A headline-making case out of Utah. Accused of poisoning and killing her husband. If she did it, if she planned this, how in the world can you come on live TV, put yourself in the spotlight, want publicity for your product, and tell us that the most important thing to you

is to keep his memory alive each and every day? That's a lot to process, especially in a small valley like this. It's pretty heavy stuff. And soon, there would be even more to process. An unusual hearing that would reveal new details in the case, where a judge would decide whether Corey would stay behind bars or not. If she gets out on bail, I will be afraid not only for my own life and those of all of my family, but most importantly, for the lives of Eric's three sons.

Five weeks after Corey Richens' arrest, she was still sitting in the Summit County Jail. She wanted out. On June 12th, Corey finally got her chance to ask for bail. Prosecutor Patricia Cassell was intent on keeping Corey locked up. Ms. Cassell, how would you like to proceed? We have three witnesses that we would like to call. The prosecutor made her case at a detention hearing that played out like a mini-trial. Under Utah law, to keep Corey behind bars,

Cassell needed to show the judge there was substantial evidence to support the murder charge. We talk about this all the time. Prosecutors say we don't need motive. This case has motive. Cassell said Corey had a motive for murder, money. She needed to get out of this debt, and that's the reason she killed Eric, in hopes of getting his estate, in hopes of getting his life insurance policies. She's seeing her entire dream of this, like, fantastic real estate business

sort of folding in front of her eyes. If investigators and prosecutors are right, then this was Corey's only way out, was to kill Eric. Correct. To show how badly Corey's business was doing, Brooke Harrington, the forensic accountant who had studied Corey's finances, took the stand. She told the judge that by the end of 2021,

Corey owed more than $4 million to lenders and was $22,000 overdrawn on her accounts. There are indicators of an increase of chaos and loss of control. Prosecutors said that Corey, completely unaware of Eric's secret estate plan, was counting on two windfalls from Eric's death. $1.3 million from Eric's life insurance, and millions more from his estate. But they said there was another big reason Corey chose murder, a prenup. Corey and Eric had signed one on their wedding day.

She doesn't get a whole lot if they divorce, but if he dies, she has a lot. She gets a lot of money. There's a lot to gain. That's the whole thing. She gets way more. The prosecution also argued that after Eric died, there were suspicious searches on Corey's phone. Your Honor, the state calls Chris Kotradimus.

Chris Kotradimus, a cell phone expert, testified for the prosecution. In his research, he found Corey's phone had searched the internet for, can cops force you to do a lie detector test? When does the FBI get involved in a case? And luxury prisons for the rich in America. Did the phone access an internet site of an article entitled, What Happens to Deleted Messages? Yes.

These searches, to me, as an investigator, speak to her mindset. Assuming that she was the one who typed those in, she is getting extremely worried that maybe they're starting to take a hard look at her. But Corey's attorney, Sky Lazaro, said much of the prosecution's case was just plain wrong. She said there was no proof Carmen sold drugs to Corey. That $1,300 check could be for cleaning, as it said in the memo.

They have corroborating evidence for all the things about her buying and selling fentanyl. They have zero corroborating evidence for anything related to Corey requesting it, her giving it to Corey. Lazaro said Carmen is not credible, and the detectives put pressure on her to Corey. Lazaro said Carmen is not credible and the detectives put pressure on her to talk. As for the life insurance, Corey's lawyer said Eric knew about the policies. But perhaps most importantly, she said Corey was better off with Eric alive than dead. The state's motive made no sense. There's nothing to tie it to her having any motive or in any way being in a better position from Eric's death. In fact, she's in a worse position because of his death because Eric had a business. He was continually making money.

Being bad with money does not make you a murderer. Lazaro portrayed Corey as a loving wife and mother. We're here because of a really tragic circumstance, and I don't think any of us want to forget that. I mean, especially my client. She loved her kids. She loved her husband. When Eric's sister Amy got her chance to speak, she had some very different ideas about Corey Richens. Eric died under horrendous circumstances. I am tormented at the thought of what he endured. We have watched as Corey has paraded around portraying herself as a grieving widow and victim

while trying to profit from the death of my brother. I was at the detention hearing and it was heartbreaking hearing that, you know, it was almost like a victim impact statement. Right. It was difficult to listen to that because you could tell how much love she had for her brother. Amy recalled the moment she told Corey, don't open Eric's safe. Corey looked at me with pure hatred and rage. I was messing up her plan. I was getting in her way. She punched me in the face and neck multiple times. If she gets out on bail, I will be afraid not only for my own life and those of all of my family, but most importantly for the lives of Eric's three sons. At the end of the three and a half hour hearing, the judge ruled

in the state's favor. Defending Corey Darden Richens shall continue to be detained without bail during the time she awaits trial or other resolution of the criminal charges against her. She has yet to enter a plea. In the last week or so, the cases had some new twists and turns. We're going to start this half hour with some new developments in that closely watched case we've been following here. First, prosecutors accused Corey of potential witness tampering.

They said she was trying to get her brother to tell a false story that Eric got pain pills and fentanyl from Mexico. It was laid out in this handwritten letter found in her jail cell. She said her brother would probably have to testify to this and that he could reword this however he needs to, to make the point.

Then, more headlines. This morning, the woman known for writing a children's book on grief, now accused of spinning a very different tale. The day after the letter was made public, prosecutors say Corey gave her mom an explanation in a jailhouse phone call. According to a transcript, Corey told her mother the letter was part of like a 65-page freaking mystery fiction novel that I've been working on. Whatever the letter is, Corey's lawyer says it's not witness tampering. Corey never sent it.

Perhaps forgotten in all the drama that seems to swirl around this case are three young boys who are without their father or their mother. I can't even imagine how they're going to grow up. Your dad's died

and then if it's true your mother killed your dad. How are you going to grow up like that? What would you say to those boys about their dad? Their dad was a really fun, genuine guy that worked hard. And those kids will be okay. Eric taught them right. They are smart, strong kids. They'll be okay. That's all for this edition of Dateline. We'll see you again next Friday for our two-hour

season premiere at 9, 8 central. I'm Lester Holt. For all of us at NBC News, good night.