Particle.news
Download on the App Store

Utah Author Kouri Richins Sentenced to Life Without Parole for Husband’s Fentanyl Murder

Prosecutors pointed to heavy debt, secret life‑insurance policies and incriminating phone searches.

Overview

  • Kouri Richins, sentenced Thursday in a Utah court, received life in prison without parole following a March jury verdict that found her guilty of murder and related charges.
  • Prosecutors said she served her husband a Moscow Mule spiked with fentanyl, and an autopsy found about five times a lethal dose in his system.
  • Investigators described a financial motive that included large debts, plans to collect on life insurance, and efforts to access her husband's assets.
  • The case also featured an alleged earlier poisoning try on Valentine’s Day, plus evidence of phone searches about fatal fentanyl doses and how to hide a poisoning on a death certificate, as well as a grief book she published that prosecutors cited.
  • Statements from the couple’s three sons asked the court for a life term, and her attorneys said they will appeal the conviction.