Secret trove of photos show realtor mom partying hours AFTER her wealthy husband was poisoned in alleged murder plot so she could run off with handyman lover
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Standing in the kitchen of the home that her husband’s body had been wheeled out of just hours earlier, Kouri Richins leans against the counter, a huge grin across her face.
A woman in the background shotguns a can of beer.
In another photo, Richins poses happily with a group of people including her husband Eric Richins’s best friend and one of his sisters.
Not pictured – but described in court this week – was the moment her late husband’s friend took off his pants during the night of drinking and dancing.
The photographs were taken during an impromptu ‘celebration of life’ gathering for Eric, who had died suddenly just one day earlier at the age of 39, leaving behind three young sons.
He was found dead in the early hours of March 4, 2022, in the couple’s bed at their home in Kamas, a small mountain town about 40 miles east of Salt Lake City.
His sudden death stunned friends and relatives – even more so when an autopsy later found the family man died from a fentanyl overdose.
The party images appeared to show a grieving family coming together to process a loss together, albeit in a unique way.
Standing in the kitchen of the home that her husband’s body had been wheeled out of hours earlier, mom-of-three Kouri Richins leans against the counter, a huge grin across her face - while a woman in the background shotguns a can of beer
In another photo, the 35-year-old realtor poses, smiling happily with a group of people - just one day after her husband was found dead
But what Eric’s smiling relatives didn’t know in those photos was that the widow they were hugging and embracing would soon become the lead suspect in his murder, for which Richins had pleaded not guilty.
They also had no idea that she carrying on an affair with a handyman and telling him she couldn’t wait to start a life with him.
Those happy photographs now carry a darker undertone as they were shown to jurors this week during Richins’s murder trial in Park City, Utah.
Inside the Summit County courthouse, Eric’s family has sat just rows away from Richins’s.
Yet the two families have carefully avoided each other throughout the trial.
In the hallways outside the courtroom, Eric’s father Eugene and sisters Katie and Amy greet supporters with warm hugs and quiet words of thanks.
Down the corridor, members of Richins’s family keep largely to themselves.
Inside the courtroom the divide is just as visible.
There have been no interactions between them and Richins has not acknowledged Eric’s family at any point during the proceedings.
Instead, she spends much of her time scribbling notes on a yellow pad, passing pink Post-its to her legal team and whispering with her attorneys.
Kouri Richins is accused of poisoning Eric with a fentanyl-laced Moscow Mule cocktail
Kouri Richins and her husband Eric Richins with their three young sons before his March 4, 2022 death
For more than a year after the death of her husband, Richins appeared every bit the grieving widow - even writing a children’s book about dealing with grief.
But prosecutors now allege that Richins poisoned her husband with a fentanyl-laced Moscow Mule cocktail to gain control of his $4 million estate and pursue a future with her new lover.
Images from the party were introduced in court through testimony from Richins’s longtime friend Allie Staking.
Shifting nervously on the witness stand, Staking described how friends and relatives had gathered at the home on the evening of March 5, 2022.
What began as a visit to offer condolences turned into a late-night gathering that stretched into the early hours.
‘It wasn't a party. It was remembering his life,’ she testified.
People drank, danced and talked about Eric while children played nearby, she said.
According to Staking, Richins appeared ‘distraught.’
The witness, who has known Richins since junior high, appeared deeply uncomfortable testifying.
She fidgeted with her hands and let out a heavy sigh when prosecutors said they had additional questions for her.
During a brief recess when jurors stepped out, she quietly wiped away tears.
Kouri Richins pulls a face as her former friend testifies to a conversation where the mom-of-three allegedly wished her husband was dead
The morning after that gathering brought the first sign of tension between Richins and Eric’s family.
Staking testified that Richins wanted to access Eric’s safe to ‘see what his will said’ but did not know the code.
She called a locksmith to open it.
But when Eric’s sister Amy noticed the locksmith’s van outside the home, she intervened and stopped the attempt.
Before his death, Eric had placed his estate into a trust and named his other sister, Katie, as trustee.
That meant the contents of the safe legally fell under Katie’s authority - not Richins’s.
According to Staking, the confrontation quickly became heated.
She recalled Richins crying and becoming extremely upset when she was unable to access the safe.
As the trial has unfolded over the past several weeks, Eric’s family and friends have remained largely stoic.
There has been little visible reaction as witness after witness described mounting financial problems, marital conflict and an alleged affair that prosecutors say ultimately ended in murder.
That alleged affair took center stage earlier this week.
On Wednesday, Richins’s lover Robert Josh Grossmann broke down in tears on the witness stand as prosecutors confronted him with romantic text messages exchanged between the two.
On Valentine’s Day 2022, Richins allegedly tried to poison her husband by spiking his sandwich. Jurors were shown an order and receipt for the bagel sandwich bought from a local diner
Richins showed little reaction and stared intently at the man she once told she wanted to marry.
On Thursday, Staking offered further insight into the relationship.
She testified that Richins had confided in her about the affair as early as June 2020.
In February 2022 - just weeks before Eric died - Richins told her she had ended the relationship around nine months earlier.
Text messages presented in court suggest otherwise.
They show the pair continued their relationship both before and after Eric’s death and were even planning a Caribbean vacation together in April 2022.
Just one month after her husband died, on April 8, 2022, Richins sent Grossmann a gushing message: 'I think I want you to be my husband one da.’
Another witness delivered one of the most chilling moments of testimony so far.
Richins’s friend Becky Lloyd told jurors that months before Eric’s death, Richins had made a remark that stuck with her.
Richins's friend Allie Staking testified that the poisoning story was just a joke among friends
Earlier this week, Robert Josh Grossmann testified about his affair with Richins, breaking down as their secret texts were shown in court
On February 14, 2022, Richins and Grossmann exchanged several texts including one where she asked him: 'I love you Wanna be one of my valentines'
Lloyd said the conversation happened on December 17, 2021, while the two women were wrapping Secret Santa gifts for Eric’s company, C&E Stone Masonry, where Lloyd worked.
The friends were discussing relationships and personal struggles.
Lloyd had recently gone through a divorce, and Richins was confiding about problems in her own marriage.
Richins told her she felt ‘trapped’ and feared Eric would gain custody of their three sons if they separated.
Then, Lloyd testified, Richins made a comment she could not forget.
‘In many ways it would be better if he were dead,’ Lloyd recalled Richins saying.
The remark visibly affected Eric’s family in the courtroom.
His elderly father Eugene leaned forward, resting his arms on his knees and staring down at the floor.
Across the room, Richins — dressed in a red blouse and black pants with shackles around her ankles beneath the defense table — even appeared shaken by the testimony.
She raised her eyebrows and stared at her former friend as Lloyd spoke.
Lloyd told jurors she had been struck by the comment because it sounded like ‘an inside thought, out loud.’
Richins is charged with five felonies: aggravated murder, aggravated attempted murder, two counts of insurance fraud and forgery.
If convicted, she faces life in prison.
