Kouri Richins Timeline: Conviction, Sentencing, and Appeal

A Utah jury convicted Kouri Richins of aggravated murder on March 16, 2026, and on May 13, 2026, Judge Richard Mrazik sentenced her to life in prison without the possibility of parole for poisoning her husband, Eric Richins, with fentanyl. The verdict and sentence in the Kouri Richins case covered five felony counts in all, and the life-without-parole term runs consecutive to additional prison time on the other convictions.¹

What She Was Convicted Of

After roughly three hours of deliberation, a jury of six men and two women found Richins guilty on every count she faced at trial: aggravated murder, attempted aggravated murder, two counts of insurance fraud, and forgery.² When the verdict was read, Richins lowered her head and breathed heavily.³

At sentencing about two months later, Judge Mrazik imposed the following, all consecutive:

Life without the possibility of parole for aggravated murder.
Five years to life for attempted criminal homicide.
One to 15 years on each of the two insurance fraud counts.
Up to five years for forgery.¹

The judge said a person convicted of murder and attempted murder “is simply too dangerous to ever be free.” At the time of sentencing, only 72 inmates in Utah were serving life without parole.⁴ Mrazik noted that the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole retains authority to release Richins only if it finds “by clear and convincing evidence at some future point that she is permanently incapable of being a threat to the safety of society.”⁵

How Eric Richins Died

Eric Richins, 39, died on March 4, 2022, at the home he shared with Kouri and their three sons in Kamas, Utah. Kouri told investigators she had made him a Moscow mule that evening to celebrate a real estate deal, and later found him unresponsive in their bedroom.⁶ A medical examiner determined Eric had ingested roughly five times a lethal dose of fentanyl, identified as illicit rather than medical-grade, and concluded it was taken orally.⁷

The attempted-murder conviction rested on a separate incident: a Valentine’s Day 2022 episode in which Eric became ill after eating a sandwich Kouri prepared. Several witnesses testified Eric told friends afterward he believed his wife had tried to poison him that day.⁸

Investigators initially treated Eric’s death as an overdose. Kouri was arrested on May 8, 2023, and charged with aggravated murder along with counts of forgery, insurance fraud, and mortgage fraud. She has been in custody ever since; Judge Mrazik denied bail in June 2023.⁶

What Convinced the Jury

The Housecleaner’s Testimony

The prosecution’s central witness was Carmen Lauber, a housecleaner who worked for the Richins family. Testifying under a grant of immunity, Lauber said she bought illicit pills for Kouri on four occasions in early 2022. The first came from a coworker; the next two involved meeting a dealer named Robert Crozier at gas stations after Kouri paid $1,000 each time. Lauber said Kouri left cash at a property she was flipping, and Lauber retrieved the drugs and left them at the same location or delivered them.⁹ Even after Eric’s death, Lauber testified, Richins texted her asking, “Still have your hookup?” and paid her $1,300 by check labeled “Construction clean Midway” for another purchase.¹⁰

Crozier denied at trial that he had sold fentanyl, contradicting an earlier jailhouse interview. But digital forensics analyst Chris Kotrodimos testified that cell phone records placed Lauber and Crozier at the same gas station on February 11, February 26, and March 9, 2022, matching the dates Lauber described.¹⁰

The Digital Trail

After her initial phone was seized, Kouri used a new device to search terms including “can fbi find deleted messages,” “what is a lethal.dose.of.fetanayl” (sic), and “if someone is poisned (sic) what does it go down on the death certificate as.”¹⁰ Hundreds of messages between Kouri and Lauber had been deleted, though log records confirmed the frequency of the exchanges. On the morning of Eric’s death, prosecutors showed the jury GIFs on Kouri’s phone that appeared to celebrate coming into money; after his death, she searched for “how long does life insurance companies take to pay.”¹¹

The Financial Motive

Forensic accountant Brooke Karrington testified that by March 2022 Kouri had accumulated roughly $7.5 million in debt through her house-flipping business, was paying about $80,000 per month to lenders, and was around $1.6 million in the red. By late 2021, K. Richins Realty had bounced more than $300,000 in checks to contractors.¹²

Eric held life insurance policies worth more than $2.2 million. Kouri received about $1.4 million of those proceeds in three payments between June and September 2022, and Karrington testified she spent the entire amount on debt payments, leaving just $802 in her account by September 19, 2022.¹² Roughly a month before Eric died, prosecutors said, Kouri took out an additional $100,000 policy on him, allegedly forging his signature and naming herself beneficiary. Two months before his death, she also logged into a New York Life account holding a $2 million buy/sell agreement between Eric and his business partner and tried to change the beneficiary to herself; the insurer flagged the attempt and notified Eric.¹¹

Robert Josh Grossman, a former lover, testified about their affair. Text messages between them discussing marriage and a future together were sent as early as February 15, 2022, one day after the alleged Valentine’s Day poisoning attempt.¹³

The Jailhouse Letter

In September 2023, jail officials found a handwritten letter in Kouri’s cell that prosecutors called the “Walk the Dog” letter. It laid out instructions for her brother to give false testimony that Eric had a history of buying drugs in Mexico.¹⁰ The defense argued the pages were notes for a book manuscript. Prosecutors used them as evidence of consciousness of guilt. Kouri was not charged with a separate offense for the letter.¹⁴

What the Defense Argued

Defense attorneys Kathy Nester, Wendy Lewis, and Alexander Ramos called no witnesses and did not put Kouri on the stand.¹⁵ The strategy relied on cross-examination and reasonable doubt. They stressed that investigators never recovered the fentanyl used to kill Eric, could not specify how it was administered or pin down the exact time of death, and could not confirm what he may have ingested on Valentine’s Day 2022.¹⁶

They also attacked the credibility of the two central witnesses. Lauber, a self-admitted methamphetamine user, had initially told investigators the pills she bought were oxycodone before her account expanded to include fentanyl after she was granted immunity. Crozier, the alleged supplier, denied at trial that he had sold fentanyl in early 2022.¹⁶ On the insurance fraud and forgery counts, the defense argued the state had not proven Kouri signed Eric’s name without his knowledge, with one attorney noting “wives everywhere sign their husband’s names on a lot of things.”¹¹

After the prosecution rested, the defense moved for a directed verdict on all five counts. Judge Mrazik denied it. A later mistrial motion tied to the prosecution’s closing remarks was also denied.¹⁷

The Family’s Statements at Sentencing

Sentencing fell on what would have been Eric Richins’ birthday. His sister Katie Richins-Benson told the court, “I stand before you because he can’t. He was taken away from us by a person he should have been able to trust, the person he should have trusted most in the world, his wife.”¹⁸

A licensed clinical social worker read a statement from one of the three sons: “I am angry she killed my dad… I want the judge to know my dad was a good person, and I miss my dad. I miss my dad, but I do not miss how my life used to be. I don’t miss Kouri.”¹⁸ In November 2024, a juvenile court formally awarded custody of the three boys to Eric’s family, where they continue to live.¹⁹

The Appeal

On May 26, 2026, Richins’ trial defense team filed a notice of appeal with the Utah Supreme Court, which intends to transfer the case to the Utah Court of Appeals. The appeal focuses on procedural issues and whether the trial was conducted correctly rather than reweighing the evidence. Utah law requires appellate representation by specially rostered attorneys, and the county is in the process of assigning new counsel. Nester, Lewis, and Ramos have also moved to withdraw from a separate financial crimes case.²⁰

Still Pending

Twenty-six financial crime charges filed in June 2025, including counts of mortgage fraud, money laundering, forgery, issuing bad checks, communications fraud, and a pattern of unlawful activity, remain pending. No trial date had been set as of mid-2026.²¹²² Prosecutors have alleged Richins used a power of attorney to take a $250,000 home equity line of credit against a property Eric owned before their marriage, without his knowledge, and routed the money into her company; lied to lenders about her balances; wrote herself bad checks to keep company accounts solvent; and misappropriated $45,000 from a friend’s rent-to-own down payment.

Robert Crozier, the drug dealer who testified at the murder trial, was arrested on June 17, 2026, on unrelated sex crime charges following an undercover sting operation, and is being held without bail in Box Elder County.²³

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