A Utah mom accused of poisoning her husband is on trial for murder. Here’s what to know.

Opening statements begin Monday in the trial of Kouri Richins, the Utah mother accused of killing her husband before publishing a children’s book about grief in the wake of his death.

Richins, 35, is charged with multiple felonies for allegedly poisoning her late husband, Eric Richins, in March 2022. She has been accused of spiking his drink with a deadly dose of fentanyl at their home near Park City, placing nearly five times what would be considered a lethal amount of the opioid into a Moscow Mule cocktail that she mixed and proceeded to serve to him.

In addition to counts of aggravated murder and attempted aggravated murder, Richins faces charges for mortgage fraud and forgery. She has pleaded not guilty to all counts. If convicted of murder, she could be sentenced to life in prison.

Richins’ trial is taking place in Summit County, Utah, and is expected to last until the end of March. Here’s what to know about the case.

Alleged poisoning

In the early morning hours of March 4, 2022, the Summit County Sheriff’s Office received a call from Richins, who reported that her husband was not breathing, according to a search warrant affidavit. She told detectives that she had fallen asleep with the couple’s children in the room beside the one she shared with her husband, where he had gone to bed, and noticed only when she lay down next to him at around 3 a.m. that he was “cold,” the document said.

Although Richins told law enforcement that she attempted to perform CPR on her husband, the fire and medical personnel who responded to the scene said it appeared she had not given CPR based on the state of his body.

A toxicology report conducted after Eric Richins’ death showed that an enormous dose of fentanyl killed him. His friends and family, including his wife, later told detectives that he had no history of drug use. Kouri Richins told investigators that they had celebratory drinks that night to mark the sale of a property.

During the investigation into his death, Eric Richins’ family members said that they suspected his wife was involved and recalled him advising them while he was alive that, if something happened to him, she was to blame. Eric Richins’ sister told investigators that he had believed his wife tried to kill him during a trip to Greece several years earlier, apparently by serving him a drink that made him sick. Shortly before his death, on Valentine’s Day 2022, Eric Richins broke out in hives and had trouble breathing after eating a sandwich that his wife had brought to him, according to court filings.

Kouri Richins’ attorneys have challenged the claim that she laced her husband’s Moscow Mule with fentanyl, telling CBS affiliate KUTV that the prosecution has not officially documented that theory.

Fraud, forgery

Court filings show that Eric Richins was considering divorcing his wife when he was killed. Prosecutors have said Kouri Richins, meanwhile, was under significant financial pressure from her real estate company and was also the beneficiary of multiple life insurance policies on her husband, even though he had tried to remove her from both his life insurance and will not long before he died. 

Although she claimed that the pair were celebrating a real estate purchase the night of her husband’s death, family members later told detectives that the couple had argued about whether or not to finalize the deal on a $2 million mansion that she wanted to “flip.” Kouri allegedly signed to close on the property the day after Eric died. 

Children’s book

Kouri Richins authored a children’s picture book called “Are you with me?” within a year of her husband’s death. While promoting the book, which focused on coping mechanisms to deal with the death of a loved one, Richins appeared on a local television station in Utah and explained how difficult it was for her and her three sons to lose their husband and father unexpectedly. 

Richins was arrested in May 2023 and has been denied bail multiple times.