The Utah mom accused of poisoning her husband and later writing a children’s book about grief has spoken out for the first time since her 2022 arrest—denying any wrongdoing and going scorched earth on prosecutors.
“I’ve been silent for a year, locked away from my kids, my family, my life, living with the media telling the world who they think I am, what they think I’ve done, or how they think I’ve lived,” Kouri Richins said in a recorded jailhouse statement to NBC News’s Dateline: True Crime Daily. “And it’s time to start speaking up.”
“You took an innocent mom away from her babies. And this means war.”
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The bold declaration is the latest twist in Richins’ wild, true-crime saga. Prosecutors allege that Richins, a 34-year-old mother of three, was drowning in debt and marital troubles when she took steps to murder her 39-year-old husband, Eric, in March 2022. She allegedly took out six insurance policies totaling $2 million in his name and secured drugs from an acquaintance, specifically “some of the Michael Jackson stuff.” (Jackson fatally overdosed on anesthetic propofol.)
Less than a week after receiving the drugs, prosecutors allege that she spiked her husband’s Moscow Mule cocktail with five times the lethal dose of fentanyl. She then called 911 to report her husband, who was found at the foot of the bed in their Utah home, was “cold to the touch.”
A year after his death, Richins released an illustrated children’s book, Are You With Me?, meant to “offer comfort and solace to young minds” dealing with grief. The book was featured on a local TV segment, where Richins said her late husband died “unexpectedly.”
Richins was arrested last year and is being held in Summit County Jail on aggravated murder and other charges. She has yet to enter a plea. Her defense team has argued no evidence ties Richins to the crime, there were no drugs found at the home, and she has not benefited from her husband’s death.
This week, a judge granted her lawyers' request to withdraw from her case after an “irreconcilable and nonwaivable situation.”
“My defense team has been forced to withdraw from my case,” Richins told NBC. “Represented or not, we all know and should understand there’s only so much I can say. But what I will say is this withdrawal was not my choice. And it was not a personal choice of any counsel on my defense team.”
The request came after defense lawyers argued prosecutors committed “severe violations” that compromised the case and Richins’ constitutional rights. Among those violations, they argued, was the prosecution’s decision to listen to some recorded jailhouse calls between Richins and her team without their consent.
In a filing about the alleged violation, Richins’ team said prosecutors justified their actions by insisting the defense did not use a phone app needed to shield attorney-client calls. (Prosecutors have insisted that the defense motion, which they plan to respond to by the end of the month, is “materially inaccurate” and filed in “bad faith.”)
In her jailhouse statements, Richins slammed prosecutors for delaying her case and hiding their “corruption.”
“I will not play into the prosecution’s unconstitutional behavior anymore,” she added. “Although I am extremely disappointed with where we’re at right now with this case, I’m anxious. I’m anxious to prove my innocence. I’m anxious to get to trial.”
