Emily Palmer is a Senior Crime Writer at PEOPLE, where she has been a reporter since 2023. Her work has frequently appeared in The New York Times. She has also been published in The Boston Globe, Cosmopolitan Magazine and ELLE Magazine.
Wrapping Christmas presents with a friend months before her husband's sudden death, Kouri Richins allegedly said she "felt trapped" in her marriage "and didn't see a way out."
Months later, prosecutors allege she poisoned Eric Richins's evening cocktail with five times the amount of lethal fentanyl in a murder she had attempted before.
In a new court filing obtained by PEOPLE, prosecutors allege the Utah soccer mom who went on to write a children's book about her husband's death was desperate to keep her husband's money as well as custody of their children, while committing romantically to a man they alleged was her "paramour."
On December 17, 2021, Kouri allegedly told her friend - "Witness 8" in court documents - that "she was frustrated because she didn't feel that she had an easy path forward in divorcing Eric Richins," the documents state.
She worried her husband "would turn" her three boys "against her" and that Eric's affluent ranching family "would use their finances to take the children from her," state the documents.
Prosecutors allege in the documents Kouri said that "in many ways it would be better if Eric Richins was dead."
The bombshell is part of a 42-page filing by prosecutors outlining evidence to proceed to trial in connection with Eric's March 4, 2022 death.
On Wednesday, May 15, that scheduled preliminary hearing was delayed until June, KJZZ14 reports.
Kouri is charged with aggravated murder and attempted aggravated murder, the latter for an earlier alleged attempt on Eric's life with a poisoned Valentine's Day sandwich. She also faces charges of distributing a controlled substance and mortgage and insurance fraud.
PEOPLE contacted Kouri's lawyer, Skye Lazaro, who did not immediately respond to the new filing. In previous interviews those closest to Kouri claimed to PEOPLE that she was framed by Eric's family and that Kouri was madly in love with her husband, who friends claimed cheated on her and had a problem with drugs.
But prosecutors now say that the day after Kouri's conversation with her friend, she allegedly texted her own "paramour."
"I'm in love with a man that's not my husband," she allegedly texted him, adding: "I can't break up my family. It's having your cake and eating it too."
"I thought you were getting a divorce," he replied.
Prosecutors claim Kouri also "booked a five-night all inclusive, romantic accommodation" at Secrets St. Martin Resort & Spa in the Caribbean for the couple, scheduled for a month after Eric's death.
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When Eric died, she allegedly owed over $3.1 million on investments she had made for her real estate business flipping houses, according to prosecutors, who say Kouri thought she could make up the difference through life insurance claims she had allegedly made on Eric's estate, then estimated to be worth $5 million.
"Her bank accounts were exhausted, and she was spiraling toward total financial collapse," prosecutors claim in the filing. Even still, she was allegedly "two or three days away from closing on an additional $3,259,850 in debt" to buy an unfinished mansion in Midway "that would require millions of dollars to complete," according to the filing.
That Midway mansion was purchased in the real estate deal Kouri later told police the couple had been celebrating with a Moscow Mule just hours before Eric's death.
She also allegedly discussed the mansion with her paramour nine days earlier, say prosecutors.
"Uhhh.. I have a crazy dream! You quit your job.. I divorce and come up with millions and millions.. We buy midway and live in the guest house," she allegedly wrote, adding: "Raise some kid.. Have a little farm? Deal?"
Then, two days before Eric's death, she allegedly texted: "Life is going to be different I promise. Your (sic) one hell of a patient person."
Kouri is set to return to court for the three-day preliminary hearing beginning June 18.
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