The Utah woman who wrote a children’s book about coping with grief after allegedly murdering her husband has been sued for $13m by his family.
The lawsuit against Kouri Richins was filed in state court on Tuesday by Katie Richins, the sister of Ms Richins’ late husband Eric Richins.
In her lawsuit, Katie Richins accused Kouri Richins of financial wrongdoing before and after her brother’s tragic death, aged 39.
According to the Associated Press, Kouri Richins took money from Eric’s bank accounts, diverted money that was earmarked for his taxes, and obtained a fraudulent loan, prior to his death last March.
“Kouri committed the foregoing acts in calculated, systematic fashion and for no reason other than to actualize a horrific endgame – to conceal her ruinous debt, misappropriate assets for the benefit of her personal businesses, orchestrate Eric’s demise, and profit from his passing,” the lawsuit stated.
Kouri Richins was arrested on 8 May and charged with first-degree murder and possession of controlled substances, as prosecutors alleged she murdered Eric with a lethal, fentanyl-laced cocktail in March 2022.
She later self-published a children’s book about dealing with grief, titled Are You With Me? and continued promoting it in the weeks before her arrest.
On 10 May, two days after Kouri Richins’s arrest, Eric’s family filed a petition to invoke the state’s “slayer statute”, a Utah law that states killers cannot profit from their crimes.
As per this petition, the family alleged Kouri Richins had a financial motive to kill Eric. It states that the accused murderer was facing financial problems as early as 2016. A realtor, Kouri Richins allegedly started stealing money from Eric to flip houses, according to a KPCW report.
In September 2020, Eric discovered Kouri Richins had withdrawn at least $100,000 from his bank account and charged $30,000 on his credit cards, according to his family. She also used his power of attorney to receive a $250,000 loan, and cashed checks from his stone masonry business.
Kouri Richins reportedly admitted taking the money when Eric confronted her about it, KPCW reported.
Less than two years later, Kouri Richins allegedly logged into Eric’s life insurance policy agreement with his business partner “and changed them for each other’s beneficiary to her as the only beneficiary,” according to a 2022 search warrant obtained by Fox News Digital.
Katie Richins’s lawsuit also seeks to prevent Kouri Richins from selling her grief book and return any money made from it, claiming it includes references to events and details from Eric’s life and relationships with his three sons, aged 10, nine, and six.
Earlier this month, Kouri Richins was refused bail at a four-hour detention hearing when a judge ruled she posed a “substantial danger” after witnesses for the prosecution reportedly testified she had committed a “disturbingly calculated murder”.
Prosecutors claimed Kouri Richins drugged a Moscow Mule with five times the lethal dose of fentanyl, and gave it to her husband on the night he died.
Eric Richins had previously allegedly told his friends and family he believed Kouri was trying to poison him.
According to reports, Eric Richins changed his will and life insurance beneficiary from his wife to his sister in the months before he died.
Additional reporting by Associated Press.
