June 2, 2023 • 43 mins
The Utah mom who allegedly killed her husband with a lethal dose of fentanyl mixed into a Moscow Mule throws a party less than 24 hours after Eric Richins is found dead in their home.
Kouri Richins hosts the celebration at a $2 million home the couple planned to flip, after a busy day of closing on the home and deleting all of her text messages inviting friends to the party.
The acquaintance who sold Richins the fentanyl she used to poison her husband is on the guest list.
Joining Nancy Grace Today:
- Jarrett Ferentino- Homicide Prosecutor, Facebook & Instagram: Jarrett Ferentino
- Caryn Stark - Psychologist- Trauma and Crime Expert; Twitter: @carnpsych
- Justin Boardman- Former Detective, West Valley City Police Department Special Victim’s Unit; Boardman Training & Consulting
- Joe Scott Morgan - Professor of Forensics: Jacksonville State University, Author, "Blood Beneath My Feet", Host: "Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan", Twitter: @JosephScottMorg
- Dave Mack- CrimeOnline Investigative Reporter
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Many people, be at woman or man that lose their
spouse go into a deep, deep depression. Some can't eat,
they can't drink, They go into seclusion. Many don't even
want to live anymore. But this Mary widow through a
(00:30):
house party, Imancy, Grace, this is crime Stories. Thank you
for being with us here at Fox Nation in serious
XM one eleven.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
First of all, take a listen to our friends at NBC.
Speaker 3 (00:42):
This whole entire place will sleep up to sixty people.
Speaker 4 (00:48):
The listing agent telling NBC News Corey is currently selling
this house, purchased just a week after her husband's death.
Detectives say the couple had argued about the property, which
Corey wanted to flip. The agent says this rendering shows
plans for a four to six million dollar renovation of
the ten acre estate, but police say Eric told his
(01:08):
family he no longer wanted to buy the house because
it would lose a significant amount of money. The day
after Eric was found dead, investigator say Corey reached a
deal on the home, and that same day through a
party at her house where she was drinking and celebrating
with friends.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
Wow, and it wasn't just a house. This house was
over two million dollars valued unfinished twenty thousand square feet
on a nearly nine acre plot of land. Okay, joining
me an all star panel to make sense of what
we know right now. But first to Jarrett Farantino, homicide prosecutor.
(01:49):
You can find him on Facebook and Insta at Jarrett Farantino. Jarrett,
thanks for being with us. Jarrett, you know money, greed, Greed,
greed one of the seven Deadly sins. Now, of course,
you know the seven daily sins is set forth in
Canterbury Tales. Is not necessarily the law by which we live,
(02:10):
but a lot of murders have been committed over greed.
Speaker 5 (02:14):
Nancy, I look at this case and I think about
we said when we were talking about doctor Craig, the
dentist that poisoned his wife, there's a special place in
hell for people that kill out of greed and selfishness.
And that's exactly what this is all about. Corey Richards
was in love with a lifestyle.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
A lifestyle, that's a really good way to put it,
Jarrett Farantino.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
A lifestyle.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Was it a lifestyle she could not sustain with a husband,
or was it a lifestyle she couldn't have with a husband,
because here you see him putting the brakes on buying
this two million dollar house. And you know, they buy
and they flip, and I guess she wanted to flip
this house or did she want to move into this house?
(03:03):
But I do know this. The day after he dies,
she throws a celebration, a big party, to celebrate closing
the deal on the house. Forget about him, he's cold
and dead. Let's look forward at the house.
Speaker 5 (03:19):
You know, Nancy, one other thing, and you've prosecuted these cases.
This is something events like this, actions like this, a
party after the death, that will come in to the
ultimate prosecution in this case. Here's why her actions before
and her actions after all are relevant to her true
(03:39):
intentions in the case. She's celebrating at the death of
her husband, a father of three young children, because she
accomplished her goal get him out of the way, get
this property, get money, and that's what she was partying about.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Can we walk through these steps, everybody on the panel?
Do I have to keep reminding you this is not
high tea at Windsor Castle with Camilla and Charles.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Okay, jump in. It's more like a rugby game.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
No pads, no protection, head on collision and who wins
to the inn remains to be seen. Let's talk through
all the steps of throwing a party. Can we just
start right there? Let me go to Karen Stark joining me,
renowned psychologists joining us from Manhattan trauma and crime expert.
You can find her at Karenstark dot com. That's Karen
(04:29):
with a CE. Karen a party. You know, I'm gonna
throw you by the fourth party like we do every
single year. And we really, as we say, down south,
put on the dog. I mean, we have so much fun.
Typically we get a slippy slide which results in a
big mudhole in the yard. I see you shuddering over there, Jackie, fireworks,
(04:55):
the whole shebang. Okay, and you have to think about
it ahead of time.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
What are you gonna cook?
Speaker 1 (05:03):
What are you going to serve?
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Sending out the evites?
Speaker 1 (05:06):
On and on and on? Did we forget anybody? Who
do we invite? Last year? Don't want to leave anybody out?
That takes a minute, Right, So when was she doing
the party planning?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Well, Nancy, you're talking about a cycle path right.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Wait a minute, I just figured it out, Karen. Start
you know, I will lose the thought if I don't
tell you immediately. Okay, Kelly, maybe she did the party
planning while her husband was lying in bed dying of
a massive fentanyl overdose. Remember, she was texting a lot,
and we can't seem to find out what she and
her friend were texting about. So maybe it was all
(05:41):
the party planning. Because the day after he's dead, she
has a big party, I mean, with all the works
and trimmings. So when was that planned before he died,
after he died while he was dying. I'd be very
curious to find out. Karen start, Hey, Hey, we need
to make a note of this to Joe Scott Morgan,
(06:02):
Justin Borman, Jarrett Farantino, and Dave Mack. When did she
invite people to the party? Was it after the husband died,
while he was dying, or before he died. I really
want to know that because you just heard Jarrett Farentino,
veteran trial lawyer, state that her actions after the death
(06:22):
of her husband can come into evidence. That's absolutely correct
in the law. So I want to find out when
these party invites went out. Okay, I got it out, Karen,
go ahead.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Well, what I wanted to say is when you think
about someone who's a psychopath, right, they don't have any feelings.
So of course she's able to have a party. I
don't know when she planned it, but she's a liar too.
She told them, she told the police that her phone
was turned off what you were talking about, and they
(06:56):
discovered in fact that she was. There was a lot
of movements txed people back and forth. Maybe she was
planning it at that point. And also Nancy a day
after or a few days after, she hired somebody to
break into the state.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Great minds think, Oh, I I'm moving right along to that.
After I talked about the party invites, nobody apparently is
interested in my party theory that throwing this big party
with all of her friends is significant, not just the
audacity of it, not just the behavioral oddity. But I'm
(07:32):
talking about digital evidence that we can get about when
she planned the party. What did she say, Hey, my
husband's debit, We're still going to have the party. Did
she say that before, during, or after?
Speaker 5 (07:44):
Nancy?
Speaker 1 (07:45):
Who is this this? Dave mac oh Okay, Dave May
joining me Crime Online dot Com investigative reporter, Do you
have an answer?
Speaker 6 (07:52):
Well, we have this Nancy every time Cory Richins was
texting her friends, okay about anything in the month leading
up to the death of Eric Richards, she deleted the data.
So what we know is that, as she this was
not necessarily a planned event with invitations, like you talked
(08:14):
about high tea in London.
Speaker 1 (08:17):
But what it is, Windsor Castle is not in London,
number one. Let's get that straight. Okay, that is where
Queen Elizabeth hung out with the Duke. It's beautiful, it's serene,
it's bucolic. London is a whole other can of worms. Okay,
let's just get that straight. You're the investigative reporter. Don't
(08:38):
just blurt out Windsor Castle is in London. Okay, go ahead.
Speaker 6 (08:42):
Okay, now that I'm pulling out the globe to start studying,
let me get back to this for a minute.
Speaker 7 (08:48):
What she did was it.
Speaker 6 (08:50):
Wasn't like they had butlers and servants and everybody showing up.
She called her closest friends and then texted or deleted
whatever she had already said to come on over.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
We're throwing down.
Speaker 6 (09:02):
Because this plan of action, this entire event that took
place at that party Nancy was actually based on an
entire lie. This is where everything crumbled, because everyone on
Eric's side of the family knew he was not into
this mansion building flip right. He was against it. He
wasn't going forth. She immediately as soon as he's dead,
she closes on the thing within twenty four hours. Okay,
(09:24):
she buys the house that they were disagreeing about and
calls her friends to come over and celebrate. But she
told the police that the night Eric died when she
made him the Moscow Mule, that that's what they were celebrating.
They had closed on it earlier that day, so immediately
she had lied, tripping everything up at the very beginning
with that party being right there at the genesis of
(09:46):
the whole thing. So police immediately knew, wait a minute,
this is not right.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
So somebody is jumping on my party bandwagon here and
it is Dave Matt with Crime on Line. Hey, Dave,
I want to confirm a couple of things you said.
I just want to reiterate them. So I'm marshaling the evidence.
What does that mean? As you're at Ferentino can tell
you when you've got a lot of evidence, you have
to marshal or organize it. That's what that means, and
(10:11):
I'm getting down to the timing of this party, big party,
a lot of friends over. Now I know she lied
to the cops according to what we just heard from
Dave Mac about when the closing was. Are you telling me,
Dave Mac, that the closing occurred within twenty four hours
after the husband's death.
Speaker 7 (10:30):
That's what I'm saying, Well, not closing.
Speaker 6 (10:32):
She reached a deal on thisa deal within twenty fe Yes,
Ma'am'm not closing. It takes time to set that up.
But yet she reached the deal because it was in
limbo with Eric alive. She hadn't reached the deal because
you wouldn't allow it. And as he was dead, she's
on the phone talking to whoever she's buying it from
and they're making plans to go in and destruct a
deal on the price. And then she actually called the
Prinsilla's party.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
Okay, let me one more question regarding the party.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
The emails or texts that she sent to her friends
to come over and party celebrate the closing. Did she
delete that data.
Speaker 6 (11:03):
We don't have any record that police uncovered any information
detailing the party and invitations to it.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Because I'm not quite sure which friends, emails and text
she deleted. Guys, we know that information was deleted. Take
a listen to our cut seventeen from ku TV.
Speaker 8 (11:27):
Evidence gathered in the death investigation revealed Corey claims she
was away from her phone that night and it was
left on a charger by her bed teams. However, gathered
evidence the phone was in use during that time and
sent messages had been deleted.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
There you hear sent messages deleted. There's a lot more
digital evidence to analyze. But why would you delete simple
party invitations? I mean, as Jackie here knows, who rifles
through my cell phone all.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
The time, Nothing is ever deleted.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
It's a treasure trove of whatever you want to find,
So why would she go to the trouble to delete
party invites texting her friends? Hi, guys, Nancy Grace here,
Please join us now on Fox Nation for a brand
(12:21):
new investigation, Parallels of Evil the Bundy and Idaho killings.
In this gripping special investigation, we bring together an incredible
panel of guests who analyze disturbing similarities of evil between
these horrible crimes. We speak with two female Ted Bundy survivors,
(12:45):
Karen Pryor and Cheryl Thomas, who described their life before
and after they were victims of Ted Bundy. We also
speak with the renowned private investigator Bill Warner, who worked
the case is and Ted Bundy's defense attorney, John Henry Brown.
We traveled to Moscow, Idaho, to speak with Washington State
(13:08):
University students and interview neighbors of Brian Coburger. One neighbor
shares exclusive insights about the suspect in the Idaho killings,
Brian Coburger. Don't miss Parallels of Evil, the Bundy and
Idaho Killings, streaming now exclusively on Fox Nation.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
Time Stories with Nancy Grace.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
You know, Justin Boardman is with us SI detective formerly
with West Valley CITYPD Special Victims Unit, now at Boardman
Training and Consulting. Justin, this is your neck of the woods?
What can you tell us?
Speaker 7 (14:01):
Yeah, it is my neck of the woods. In fact,
I lived for a while just half a mile or
so away from the property that she purchased a flip,
which seems to be cursed because the former owner committed
suicide in there, and it's been in limbo and been
(14:21):
an eyesore for the community for such a long time.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
It's hard for me to imagine a two million dollar
home being an eyesore. But I guess beauty is in
the eye of the beholder.
Speaker 7 (14:30):
Go ahead, Yeah, it certainly is, mainly because it's been
just half finished. Sitting there.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
Oh yes, I'm looking at a photo of it right now.
It's big.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
It's beautiful, gorgeous location.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
If you're into garish, I guess this would qualify.
Speaker 7 (14:47):
But very true.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
Also, it's on a beautiful track of land, and I
believe it was close to ten acres. The scenery is
worth it because behind this home, as just and boardman
is telling us with boardman training and consulting, if you
look at it in the background, are these beautiful snow
(15:09):
capped heels, the big sky. It's really a vista that
I guess may be worth the money if you have it.
And it is a big home. It's a big home.
It's a honk and big home. Hell, let's say twenty
thousand plus square feet right?
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Wow?
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Okay, so you live not far from this, correct. Have
you spoken to anyone that knew the Richens.
Speaker 7 (15:37):
Yeah? I spoke to somebody the other day at the
Memorial Day neighborhood party that mentioned that she was friends
with her and this was just a very huge surprise
to her friends because they did not see this monster,
(15:58):
a lurking beneath the surf, if you will.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
So they were surprised.
Speaker 7 (16:02):
They were surprised absolutely.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Okay, well, that's in direct contradiction to Eric Richard's family.
Take a listen to our cut twenty eight our friends
at NBC.
Speaker 4 (16:13):
Now, the family of the father of three is speaking out,
saying they've long been suspicious of his wife, Corey. Does
Eric's family believe Corey killed him?
Speaker 9 (16:24):
I think the family has always felt that Corey was
somehow involved in his death.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
The thirty three year old real estate agent turned children's
book author has been charged with his murder, police alleging
she poisoned her thirty nine year old husband last March
with a massive dose of fennol, and according to court documents,
Eric's family told investigators, it may not have been the
first time she poisoned him.
Speaker 9 (16:48):
He felt like Corey was trying to kill him and
that if he did die, that she should be investigated
for that.
Speaker 6 (16:55):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
So the family wasn't surprised at all, because, according to them,
this father of three thought his wife had long been
trying to kill him. But he would not accept that.
It was more like a joke to him. But as
we know, many a true word is spoken in jest,
(17:16):
alternately seriously telling his sister about what he perceived was
an attempt on his life while the family was vacationing
in Greece, and then hey, she's doing it for the money,
ha haha. You know, I've noticed Karen Stark's psychologists joining
us out of Manhattan that very often people joke about
(17:37):
things which are deadly serious, things that maybe even scary
to them. Is that just a way of dealing with fear.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
Well, exactly, Nancy. A lot of humor is based on
people being fad or fearful, and the way that they
can make it be okay is to lighten it up.
But I don't think that this man was actually thinking
it was funny. I think that he really understood that
(18:06):
she wanted him to be dead, that she had tried
to kill him. And I want to add that that
was not the first time.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Oh absolutely not. You know, I noticed something and I
don't know if you've noticed this in your death investigations.
Joe Scott Morgan with me is death investigator Joseph Scott
Morgan professor forensics at Jacksonville State University, author of Blood
Beneath My Feet on Amazon, and star of a hit
(18:35):
series and I mean a hit Body Bags with Joe
Scott Morgan, you and I together worked on the case
of Ellen Greenberg, a beautiful young teacher who was stabbed.
I believe it was twenty two times, mostly in the
back and the back of the head, in the back
of the neck, and her murder was ruled a suicide.
(18:59):
And I have been pushing that case since we heard
about it. When I visited her parents, Joe Scott, her
mother was very solemn, pleasant, but solemn because we were
talking about our daughter's murder. The father, who was a
(19:20):
really nice guy, kept cracking jokes the whole interview, and
a couple of times I had a barbed response because
I really think it was appropriate. But later I saw
him standing in the family kitchen and his eyes were
filled with tears. We went to, as you know, her
(19:43):
grave site, and the family told me that they had
not been to her grave site because it was so
quippling painful for them to have to see her grave
and deal with the fact that she's never ever coming home.
And I think, you know, I look back on him
(20:05):
cracking jokes and I wish I had not responded so harshly,
because I think it was his way. I mean, we
were going through the whole murder and what happened, and
how excited she was about her wedding, and I think
he was just that was his way of dealing with
our content.
Speaker 9 (20:24):
Joscott, you know, I've made, as I've told you before,
I've made probably in person, over two thousand death notifications
over the course of my career. I've seen people break
out in hysterical laughter when when I've notified them. And
you know, I don't like the term defense mechanism. It's
a reactionary thing though they don't know what to do
with these emotions at well up. And I can only
(20:45):
imagine in this particular case, where the family is is
actually you know, essentially hitting the chest with a ten
pound sledgehammer when they're made aware that there is apparently
a viper living among them. And I mean that in
the purest sense, because this guy was poisoned, Nancy. And
(21:07):
you know, in forensics, it's hard, particularly when you talk
about drug chemistries, for people to kind of grasp some numbers.
Just let me throw something out to you real quick. Okay,
if you if we go to the store and we
buy talanol, all right, talanol comes in like three hundred
and twenty five milligram tablets, right, and some people look
at him say, go, that's like a horse bill. You know,
you took this thing down. He was dosed with fentanyl,
(21:30):
a lethal dosage of fentanyl. Nancy. Now get this what
I say about talanol three hundred twenty five milligrams, right,
Fentanyl two milligrams is lethal. He was given ten times
out of mount I mean five times out of mount
per the medical examiner, and the medical examiner also determined.
Now I find this very intriguing. You know, fentanyl is
(21:53):
a Schedule too drug. You can actually be prescribed fentanyl,
but he determined the medical examiner determined that it was
actually illicit fentanyl.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Hey, before you go one more step, I've got a
question right there.
Speaker 6 (22:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Yeah, I knew that they had determined that this huge
fentanyl overdose that he received, we think in a Moscow
mule that she prepared for him, But I knew they
could determine that it was illicit. In other words, illegal
fentanyl was supposed to like a pain patch or appeal
that you get pursued to a doctor's prescription and you
pick it up at the pharmacy. How can you look
(22:27):
at it under a micro Well, they don't have a
microscope there. Weuld get of the pill itself. They had
to extract it from his body. How can you look
at it and tell when you're looking at let's just
say blood and say this is illegal fentanyl as supposed
to prescribed fentanyl.
Speaker 9 (22:45):
Let's say let's say that the illicit fentanyl, the illegal fentanyl,
was created in a lab and it was made in
tablet form, which many times it is, and it can
be in a liquid form too, but in a tablet
form when it's made in an hour actual legitimate pharmaceutical environment.
When they make the tablets, it's not pure fentanyl. It's
(23:06):
just like it's not pure talinol. They're binders in there,
and there are certain chemical signatures that you look for.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
When you say a binder, you mean like baking soda
or something like that to hold it together.
Speaker 9 (23:16):
Yeah, exactly. You know, we've we've had all kinds of
things over the years, Nancy. I mean people would cut drugs,
for instance, with like talcum powder, baby formula. Quinine has
been around for years and years. So if you get
these kind of weirdo, you know, signatures, chemical signatures, they're thinking, Okay,
we see the molecule for which which fentyl is a
synthetic opioid. You know, you think about heroin, which is
(23:39):
kind of naturally occurring, comes from the poppy plant. This
is something that synthesized, it's made in the lap. So
you're looking at this and you're thinking, oh my gosh,
you know this is something we see the the synthetic
molecule there, but there's all these weirdo attachments that are
there that shouldn't be there.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
So they can pick up those molecules. Even though they're
extracting the toxin from blood, they get some blood or
stomach contents.
Speaker 9 (24:04):
Uh, they're not well, not just that urine is a
fantastic sample to pull this from when we're looking for opioids.
You know, any kind of whether synthetic or naturally occurring,
and stomach contents are good and you know, with people
might not know this, but when you're at autopsy and
you open up the body, it's something if anybody's ever
(24:26):
smelled someone in the morning after they've had a big
drunk on the night before. You can smell alcohol on
that person when you open up the body. If they
have alcohol board, even if it's just a slight amount,
it'll knock you to your knees. Many times. At autopsy,
you know that alcohol's there, and within the stomach content,
you can actually pull out a sample of that. You
(24:47):
can spin it down, and you can actually test that substance.
And sometimes that's the only thing we have to hang
our hat on.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Well, you say spin it down, you mean separate the
urine from the toxin.
Speaker 9 (24:56):
Yeah, well, yeah, no, I'm referring to the gastric content.
So you to kind of separate.
Speaker 1 (25:01):
Spin it down means you separate the gas contents. Yeah,
liquid from the toxic.
Speaker 9 (25:06):
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And so that's what they'll do in
the laboratory. And there's there's any number of ways we
can go. And here's one more fascinating thing. I'll shut
my mouth.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
Now, please don't. It is actually fascinating.
Speaker 9 (25:15):
If they drew, If they drew vitreous fluid, which you
know we always do from the eye. Vitreous fluid is
very non specific. It's like looking at the rings on
a tree. You know, you can kind of get an
idea when there were drought, when there's a drought and
there's a rainy year, and that's where think if you
look at that analogy with virtuous fluid, you get a
qualifying amount. You say, Okay, well something has been here before,
(25:40):
all right. If they drew virtuous fluid, I'd be really
interested to see if they found it, because it takes
a lot longer for it to kind of settle into
the vitreous virtuous layer. I'd be very curious if they
found it in there, which would give you an idea.
You know, Karen mentioned a moment ago that he had
been dosed before, and that was on I think the
(26:01):
February fourteenth. She fixed him a sandwich. And what was interesting,
you know, how you reacted to that means he had
difficulty breathing, which is something that you see with opioid ods.
You know, they'll they'll become a congested, highly congested in
the face. You'll have individuals that have difficulty breathing. He
had difficulty breathing at that point time, but it kind
(26:23):
of resolves. So you know, what if just what if
that was a test run and then she said, Okay,
well I gave him this amount this time, it didn't work,
and by golly, I'm going to give him twice that
amount this time, and that maybe what happened, you know, And.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
All I asked him, what did I add? I'm so
I don't even know what the question was anymore. But
I have another question for you, Joe, Scott Morgan, and
for anybody else on this panel. The texts regard I'm
back on the party. Yeah, I'm not letting it go.
I want to find out when she texted her friends,
(26:59):
what did she say in the text Some of those,
if not all of them, were deleted, along with whomever
she was texting during the night where she said her
phone was plugged in in the bedroom with her husband
and not being used and turned off. There was activity,
the phone was moving, it was being locked and unlocked,
(27:20):
and texts were sent and received throughout the evening.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
They're deleted. Here's the question.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
I know we can recover a lot of information from
the cloud that stores all of your information.
Speaker 2 (27:36):
What about texts? Are they stored?
Speaker 1 (27:41):
Can we reconstruct the texts that she deleted? And it
leads me to Jarrett Fiorentino veteran trial lawyer, guilty conscience.
Speaker 2 (27:53):
Again, I don't.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Even know what I've ever deleted a text ever, because
that requires time. But you don't have any of that.
So why would she go to the trouble of deleting
text and can I recover them?
Speaker 5 (28:05):
Well, a couple of things. She's lying about having the
phone at the point, so she's definitely wanting to hide
the fact that she was using her phone. If you
delete texts, they are difficult to recover, believe it or not,
They're not always recoverable. What I've done, and what's done
in other investigations is you can reverse engineer this.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
The record will.
Speaker 5 (28:26):
Reveal who exactly she was texting. You can bet the
investigators are going to follow up with those individuals and say, hey,
we have a record that you were texting with Corey
that night, show us the text and you can reverse
engineer the conversation that way.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
What if they have deleted the text.
Speaker 5 (28:45):
If your only hope then, Nancy, is they're stored somewhere
in the cloud or in the depths of the phone.
And it's not always the case with text.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
See.
Speaker 5 (28:56):
The thing about a phone is it stores so much
information and it's so crazy these cases that it's often
being rewritten. It's just very hard to recreate that kind
of data. It's just not because there are so many
texts going back and forth, all of those records aren't
maintained for an extended period of time. That's where you
run into difficulty.
Speaker 1 (29:15):
Well, one thing that's interesting a lot of people are
comparing this case to the Alex Murlock double murder, the
legal heir in South Carolina that is now convicted of
murdering wife Maggie and son Paul. Their texts, phone calls,
even video scent around the time of the murders were
(29:36):
used at trial, but they had not been deleted, which
is very different from this case.
Speaker 6 (29:43):
Nancy, I don't want to interrupt you, but can I
praise do?
Speaker 7 (29:46):
Okay?
Speaker 1 (29:46):
Yes.
Speaker 6 (29:47):
On the night that Eric died after she poised, After
she allegedly poisoned him, she claimed her phone didn't move,
that she'd know right there plugged in. They were able
to prove obviously that it wasn't plugged in, that it
was moving. It had been unlocked and unlocked several times
during the time where she said she wasn't on it.
What they did find is that she had been texting
(30:08):
her best somebody they labeled the best friend who didn't
live nearby, lived some ways away. She's called cl in
some of the paperwork, and she actually had Corey had
her friend that she was texting with that night delete
their text messages, and that came up during the investigation.
(30:30):
When this person admitted to police that she had been
texting with Corey at that time of night, they said, hey,
let us see the text. She pulls out her cellphone,
hands it to him to go for it. All the
texts between her and Corey were deleted. There were plenty
of other texts on the phone, but her communication with
Corey that night all deleted.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Okay, I like it. Listen, always jump in, Dave mac.
It's like when somebody calls the last minute and says
they're coming to dinner. You go, oh great, I'll just
add more water to the soup. Place. Just keep pouring
it in, keep pouring it in, because every fact counts.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
Time stories with Nancy Grace.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
I want to point out another striking characteristic of the
data analysis. I don't know if the name Richard Debate
rings a bell, because I can never forget him. He
murdered his wife he claimed that an unknown intruder masked.
They're always masked. Remember Jody Area is Joskotte Morgan. She
(31:45):
said that two masked ninjas broke into Travis Alexander's condo,
murdered him and let her run free. Always a mask right,
So in debates case, he says a masked ruder broke
him and murdered his wife and basically did nothing to him. Okay,
(32:10):
The fitbit data on the wife's watch showed her walking
around the house long after he said she was dead,
So his stories a lie. Then I analyzed a case.
I think her name was Kelly Heron, Kelly Heron, and
(32:31):
she was jogging in Seattle and fought off an attacker
and all of the movements to corroborate her story were
caught on her fitbit. It was amazing. Same thing here
regarding the fund And I'm just wondering if she had
a fitbit or an Apple watch, they could also corroborate
(32:53):
the police theory that she was not asleep in her
son's room down the hall, that she was back and
forth moving. And we also saw in the Alex Murdoye
prosecution how many times his phone was locked and unlocked,
and we saw how many times even his door to
his suburban vehicle were opened and closed based on NAB
(33:17):
navigation data. It's amazing. So I expect that to be
a huge part of this trial. But earlier Karen Stark
brought up a fact that I find really convincing, and
that fact is that very shortly after her husband's death,
the wife in this case, Corey Richins, has a locksmith
(33:38):
come and drill into her husband's safe. Now, a lot
of women may be widows, be they male or female,
may be thinking about, oh, my goodness, I've got to
prepare the funeral, what is my spouse going to wear?
How am I going to tell all the relatives what's happened?
(34:00):
And I can't stand the thought of going through this.
But Corey Richards was of a much sturdier ilk, and
she thought to call a locksmith to come to the home.
Take a listen to our cut thirty two our friends
at ABC four.
Speaker 10 (34:15):
It's the case that just keeps unfolding. Corey has been
charged with one count of aggravated murder and three counts
of possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute.
Here's what's been amended on those charges. We've now learned
that after her husband Eric's death on March fourth, Corey
hired a locksmith to open Eric's safe containing between one
hundred and twenty five and one hundred.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
And sixty five thousand dollars.
Speaker 10 (34:37):
Eric's sister told Corey she didn't have the rights to
those funds, resulting in Corey punching her. Eric also opened
a living trust and placed the trust as his life
insurance beneficiary instead of Corey. We also now know that
Corey had purchased at least four life insurance policies on
Eric richins with death benefits.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
Of over a million dollars. That has a lot of information.
Us here one more time, our friends at ABC four.
Speaker 10 (35:03):
It's the case that just keeps unfolding. Corey has been
charged with one count of aggravated murder and three counts
of possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute.
Here's what's been amended on those charges. We've now learned
that after her husband Eric's death on March fourth, Corey
hired a locksmith to open Eric's safe containing between one
hundred and twenty five and one hundred and.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
Sixty five thousand dollars.
Speaker 10 (35:24):
Eric's sister told Corey she didn't have the rights to
those funds, resulting in Corey punching her. Eric also opened
a living trust and placed the trust as his life
insurance beneficiary instead of Corey. We also now know that
Corey had purchased at least four life insurance policies on
Eric ritchins with death benefits of over a million dollars.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Okay, this is what jumps out at me in a
probative manner. In other words, can I use it to
prove something at trial? Immediately following her husband's death, she's
not planning the funeral, notifying relatives. She's hiring a locksmith
to drill into her husband's safe to get out about
one hundred and sixty five thousand dollars in cash. Her
(36:06):
husband's sister said, whoa wait, wait, you don't have a
right to that money. And what does she do? She
punches her sister in law, punches her, I believe in
the face. We also learn that the deceased husband, Eric Richards,
opened a living trust and placed the trust as his
(36:30):
life insurance beneficiary to a sister, not his wife. We
also know that the widow the merry widow Corey Richins,
purchased four life insurance policies on her husband with death
benefits millions of dollars. Okay, all of that is probative
(36:54):
to Justin Boardman joining me former detective West Valley City PD,
now running Boardman Training and consultant. And this is his jurisdiction.
Which one of those do you want to take a
crack at first?
Speaker 7 (37:09):
Wow? Probably the life insurance policy. You know, usually, and well,
at least in my cases, I've had to have, like
when I took out a life insurance policy on a
wife or something like that, I've had to notify them
(37:32):
that it was being done. And that doesn't seem like
that was the case. So that's certainly something that sticks
out to me.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
Right. In other words, her taking a life insurance policy
and her husband was not unusual, but the fact that
she took out four and failed to notify him as
is customary suggests a nefarious motive. And I got to
tell you this, Justin, if my husband takes out four
brand new life insurance policies on me, I'm calling his mother,
(38:06):
even if I had to do it through seance in
reporting him. She's the only person he's ever been the
least bit afraid of. So I'm gonna have to call
for Heavenly aid on that for life insurance policies, and
doesn't notify him because we see him changing the beneficiary
from her to somebody else because he's afraid.
Speaker 7 (38:25):
Absolutely, and obviously he was thinking that this might this
might turn into this homicide, you know, certainly like with Josh.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Powell and Susan Susan Powell in.
Speaker 7 (38:40):
Case, I worked the outskirts of a little bit out
of my former jurisdiction where she left a note saying
that if I ended up dead, this is who probably
did it, pointing to her husband.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
And he was never arrested for a murder and her
body has never been found, so there's definitely a trail
being left. I find the greed aspect overwhelming that she
was hiring a locksmith while she could have been planning
not a party, but gathering after the funeral, or her
(39:18):
words at the funeral. Karen Stark, Well.
Speaker 3 (39:23):
It's not only that, Nancy, I mean, think think of
everything that we're talking about. I mean, here she's attacking
her sister in law for telling her.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
Now it's my next thing, Karen Stark. I believe you've
met on the set a couple of times. My sister's
in law, jan and Donna, and I got to tell
you how blessed I was never a crossword ever. And
this woman is punching the sister in law.
Speaker 3 (39:56):
The just picture that her husband is dead, she's supposed
to be grieving, and just the idea of punching her
sister in law when you don't actually see people walking
around and punching their family in the face. And then
none of that shows signs of someone who's distraught. There's
(40:18):
nothing distraught about her. And one of the other things
that she did, which hasn't been mentioned yet, Nancy, is
that she changed his life insurance policies without him knowing
that he was doing with his partner.
Speaker 1 (40:34):
And he finds out and changes it back. Right, he
should have said a chill down his spine. But I'm
back on okay. Two things. The hiring a locksmith. I
mean she's not trying to find an organist for the wedding,
I mean that organist for the funeral. Instead, she's hiring
(40:54):
a locksmith to get that cash.
Speaker 3 (40:58):
You set a wedding for a reason, nance, Yeah, yeah,
you're right. Your reason you made that mistakes. That's definitely
a Freudian slipp It's because she was acting more like
it was a celebration than it was the funeral.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
You're so right, Karen Stark. And you know, back to
the timeline. I know nobody is taking the bait on
my party theory. But what did she go to the
liquor store and buy the booze and get the food ready?
I mean, she's having a celebration. She might as well
(41:32):
just dance across his grave.
Speaker 6 (41:35):
One of the things about the party aspect that has
bothered me immenseally is who has friends that would come
over and participate in a loud drinking party the day
after their friend's husband died.
Speaker 1 (41:48):
Well, let me ask you this, who do you think
that Corey Richins is hanging out with nuns and priests
and virgins? You know, I'm sure they were all on
her side.
Speaker 9 (41:57):
Nancy. I have an idea who might be coming to
that partar someone that is mentioned in these texts. It's
rather cryptic and we don't know their name yet, but
their initials are C. L. And that's the individual that
supplied her with the fentanyl. And the police know who
this individual is and so this transaction, and they they
(42:18):
frame the transaction when she purchased these illicit substances from
this individual as a hand to hand try and transaction.
That's the way the police frame this. So I'm thinking,
you know, going to you know, to your train of
thought here, who's showing up? Who in the heck is
she associating with in this world in which she endwelled?
Speaker 1 (42:40):
And Joe Scott Morgan, I'm very disappointed. I thought you
party people at Jacksonville State University throw a party. Of course,
you have to invite your dope dealer guys. If you
have any information regarding the death, the painful death of
the father of these three little boys, Eric Richards, please
(43:05):
call four three, five, six one five thirty six hundred. Goodbye,
said
Many people, be at woman or man that lose their
spouse go into a deep, deep depression. Some can't eat,
they can't drink, They go into seclusion. Many don't even
want to live anymore. But this Mary widow through a
(00:30):
house party, Imancy, Grace, this is crime Stories. Thank you
for being with us here at Fox Nation in serious
XM one eleven.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
First of all, take a listen to our friends at NBC.
Speaker 3 (00:42):
This whole entire place will sleep up to sixty people.
Speaker 4 (00:48):
The listing agent telling NBC News Corey is currently selling
this house, purchased just a week after her husband's death.
Detectives say the couple had argued about the property, which
Corey wanted to flip. The agent says this rendering shows
plans for a four to six million dollar renovation of
the ten acre estate, but police say Eric told his
(01:08):
family he no longer wanted to buy the house because
it would lose a significant amount of money. The day
after Eric was found dead, investigator say Corey reached a
deal on the home, and that same day through a
party at her house where she was drinking and celebrating
with friends.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
Wow, and it wasn't just a house. This house was
over two million dollars valued unfinished twenty thousand square feet
on a nearly nine acre plot of land. Okay, joining
me an all star panel to make sense of what
we know right now. But first to Jarrett Farantino, homicide prosecutor.
(01:49):
You can find him on Facebook and Insta at Jarrett Farantino. Jarrett,
thanks for being with us. Jarrett, you know money, greed, Greed,
greed one of the seven Deadly sins. Now, of course,
you know the seven daily sins is set forth in
Canterbury Tales. Is not necessarily the law by which we live,
(02:10):
but a lot of murders have been committed over greed.
Speaker 5 (02:14):
Nancy, I look at this case and I think about
we said when we were talking about doctor Craig, the
dentist that poisoned his wife, there's a special place in
hell for people that kill out of greed and selfishness.
And that's exactly what this is all about. Corey Richards
was in love with a lifestyle.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
A lifestyle, that's a really good way to put it,
Jarrett Farantino.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
A lifestyle.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Was it a lifestyle she could not sustain with a husband,
or was it a lifestyle she couldn't have with a husband,
because here you see him putting the brakes on buying
this two million dollar house. And you know, they buy
and they flip, and I guess she wanted to flip
this house or did she want to move into this house?
(03:03):
But I do know this. The day after he dies,
she throws a celebration, a big party, to celebrate closing
the deal on the house. Forget about him, he's cold
and dead. Let's look forward at the house.
Speaker 5 (03:19):
You know, Nancy, one other thing, and you've prosecuted these cases.
This is something events like this, actions like this, a
party after the death, that will come in to the
ultimate prosecution in this case. Here's why her actions before
and her actions after all are relevant to her true
(03:39):
intentions in the case. She's celebrating at the death of
her husband, a father of three young children, because she
accomplished her goal get him out of the way, get
this property, get money, and that's what she was partying about.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Can we walk through these steps, everybody on the panel?
Do I have to keep reminding you this is not
high tea at Windsor Castle with Camilla and Charles.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Okay, jump in. It's more like a rugby game.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
No pads, no protection, head on collision and who wins
to the inn remains to be seen. Let's talk through
all the steps of throwing a party. Can we just
start right there? Let me go to Karen Stark joining me,
renowned psychologists joining us from Manhattan trauma and crime expert.
You can find her at Karenstark dot com. That's Karen
(04:29):
with a CE. Karen a party. You know, I'm gonna
throw you by the fourth party like we do every
single year. And we really, as we say, down south,
put on the dog. I mean, we have so much fun.
Typically we get a slippy slide which results in a
big mudhole in the yard. I see you shuddering over there, Jackie, fireworks,
(04:55):
the whole shebang. Okay, and you have to think about
it ahead of time.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
What are you gonna cook?
Speaker 1 (05:03):
What are you going to serve?
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Sending out the evites?
Speaker 1 (05:06):
On and on and on? Did we forget anybody? Who
do we invite? Last year? Don't want to leave anybody out?
That takes a minute, Right, So when was she doing
the party planning?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Well, Nancy, you're talking about a cycle path right.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Wait a minute, I just figured it out, Karen. Start
you know, I will lose the thought if I don't
tell you immediately. Okay, Kelly, maybe she did the party
planning while her husband was lying in bed dying of
a massive fentanyl overdose. Remember, she was texting a lot,
and we can't seem to find out what she and
her friend were texting about. So maybe it was all
(05:41):
the party planning. Because the day after he's dead, she
has a big party, I mean, with all the works
and trimmings. So when was that planned before he died,
after he died while he was dying. I'd be very
curious to find out. Karen start, Hey, Hey, we need
to make a note of this to Joe Scott Morgan,
(06:02):
Justin Borman, Jarrett Farantino, and Dave Mack. When did she
invite people to the party? Was it after the husband died,
while he was dying, or before he died. I really
want to know that because you just heard Jarrett Farentino,
veteran trial lawyer, state that her actions after the death
(06:22):
of her husband can come into evidence. That's absolutely correct
in the law. So I want to find out when
these party invites went out. Okay, I got it out, Karen,
go ahead.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Well, what I wanted to say is when you think
about someone who's a psychopath, right, they don't have any feelings.
So of course she's able to have a party. I
don't know when she planned it, but she's a liar too.
She told them, she told the police that her phone
was turned off what you were talking about, and they
(06:56):
discovered in fact that she was. There was a lot
of movements txed people back and forth. Maybe she was
planning it at that point. And also Nancy a day
after or a few days after, she hired somebody to
break into the state.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Great minds think, Oh, I I'm moving right along to that.
After I talked about the party invites, nobody apparently is
interested in my party theory that throwing this big party
with all of her friends is significant, not just the
audacity of it, not just the behavioral oddity. But I'm
(07:32):
talking about digital evidence that we can get about when
she planned the party. What did she say, Hey, my
husband's debit, We're still going to have the party. Did
she say that before, during, or after?
Speaker 5 (07:44):
Nancy?
Speaker 1 (07:45):
Who is this this? Dave mac oh Okay, Dave May
joining me Crime Online dot Com investigative reporter, Do you
have an answer?
Speaker 6 (07:52):
Well, we have this Nancy every time Cory Richins was
texting her friends, okay about anything in the month leading
up to the death of Eric Richards, she deleted the data.
So what we know is that, as she this was
not necessarily a planned event with invitations, like you talked
(08:14):
about high tea in London.
Speaker 1 (08:17):
But what it is, Windsor Castle is not in London,
number one. Let's get that straight. Okay, that is where
Queen Elizabeth hung out with the Duke. It's beautiful, it's serene,
it's bucolic. London is a whole other can of worms. Okay,
let's just get that straight. You're the investigative reporter. Don't
(08:38):
just blurt out Windsor Castle is in London. Okay, go ahead.
Speaker 6 (08:42):
Okay, now that I'm pulling out the globe to start studying,
let me get back to this for a minute.
Speaker 7 (08:48):
What she did was it.
Speaker 6 (08:50):
Wasn't like they had butlers and servants and everybody showing up.
She called her closest friends and then texted or deleted
whatever she had already said to come on over.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
We're throwing down.
Speaker 6 (09:02):
Because this plan of action, this entire event that took
place at that party Nancy was actually based on an
entire lie. This is where everything crumbled, because everyone on
Eric's side of the family knew he was not into
this mansion building flip right. He was against it. He
wasn't going forth. She immediately as soon as he's dead,
she closes on the thing within twenty four hours. Okay,
(09:24):
she buys the house that they were disagreeing about and
calls her friends to come over and celebrate. But she
told the police that the night Eric died when she
made him the Moscow Mule, that that's what they were celebrating.
They had closed on it earlier that day, so immediately
she had lied, tripping everything up at the very beginning
with that party being right there at the genesis of
(09:46):
the whole thing. So police immediately knew, wait a minute,
this is not right.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
So somebody is jumping on my party bandwagon here and
it is Dave Matt with Crime on Line. Hey, Dave,
I want to confirm a couple of things you said.
I just want to reiterate them. So I'm marshaling the evidence.
What does that mean? As you're at Ferentino can tell
you when you've got a lot of evidence, you have
to marshal or organize it. That's what that means, and
(10:11):
I'm getting down to the timing of this party, big party,
a lot of friends over. Now I know she lied
to the cops according to what we just heard from
Dave Mac about when the closing was. Are you telling me,
Dave Mac, that the closing occurred within twenty four hours
after the husband's death.
Speaker 7 (10:30):
That's what I'm saying, Well, not closing.
Speaker 6 (10:32):
She reached a deal on thisa deal within twenty fe Yes,
Ma'am'm not closing. It takes time to set that up.
But yet she reached the deal because it was in
limbo with Eric alive. She hadn't reached the deal because
you wouldn't allow it. And as he was dead, she's
on the phone talking to whoever she's buying it from
and they're making plans to go in and destruct a
deal on the price. And then she actually called the
Prinsilla's party.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
Okay, let me one more question regarding the party.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
The emails or texts that she sent to her friends
to come over and party celebrate the closing. Did she
delete that data.
Speaker 6 (11:03):
We don't have any record that police uncovered any information
detailing the party and invitations to it.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Because I'm not quite sure which friends, emails and text
she deleted. Guys, we know that information was deleted. Take
a listen to our cut seventeen from ku TV.
Speaker 8 (11:27):
Evidence gathered in the death investigation revealed Corey claims she
was away from her phone that night and it was
left on a charger by her bed teams. However, gathered
evidence the phone was in use during that time and
sent messages had been deleted.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
There you hear sent messages deleted. There's a lot more
digital evidence to analyze. But why would you delete simple
party invitations? I mean, as Jackie here knows, who rifles
through my cell phone all.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
The time, Nothing is ever deleted.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
It's a treasure trove of whatever you want to find,
So why would she go to the trouble to delete
party invites texting her friends? Hi, guys, Nancy Grace here,
Please join us now on Fox Nation for a brand
(12:21):
new investigation, Parallels of Evil the Bundy and Idaho killings.
In this gripping special investigation, we bring together an incredible
panel of guests who analyze disturbing similarities of evil between
these horrible crimes. We speak with two female Ted Bundy survivors,
(12:45):
Karen Pryor and Cheryl Thomas, who described their life before
and after they were victims of Ted Bundy. We also
speak with the renowned private investigator Bill Warner, who worked
the case is and Ted Bundy's defense attorney, John Henry Brown.
We traveled to Moscow, Idaho, to speak with Washington State
(13:08):
University students and interview neighbors of Brian Coburger. One neighbor
shares exclusive insights about the suspect in the Idaho killings,
Brian Coburger. Don't miss Parallels of Evil, the Bundy and
Idaho Killings, streaming now exclusively on Fox Nation.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
Time Stories with Nancy Grace.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
You know, Justin Boardman is with us SI detective formerly
with West Valley CITYPD Special Victims Unit, now at Boardman
Training and Consulting. Justin, this is your neck of the woods?
What can you tell us?
Speaker 7 (14:01):
Yeah, it is my neck of the woods. In fact,
I lived for a while just half a mile or
so away from the property that she purchased a flip,
which seems to be cursed because the former owner committed
suicide in there, and it's been in limbo and been
(14:21):
an eyesore for the community for such a long time.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
It's hard for me to imagine a two million dollar
home being an eyesore. But I guess beauty is in
the eye of the beholder.
Speaker 7 (14:30):
Go ahead, Yeah, it certainly is, mainly because it's been
just half finished. Sitting there.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
Oh yes, I'm looking at a photo of it right now.
It's big.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
It's beautiful, gorgeous location.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
If you're into garish, I guess this would qualify.
Speaker 7 (14:47):
But very true.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
Also, it's on a beautiful track of land, and I
believe it was close to ten acres. The scenery is
worth it because behind this home, as just and boardman
is telling us with boardman training and consulting, if you
look at it in the background, are these beautiful snow
(15:09):
capped heels, the big sky. It's really a vista that
I guess may be worth the money if you have it.
And it is a big home. It's a big home.
It's a honk and big home. Hell, let's say twenty
thousand plus square feet right?
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Wow?
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Okay, so you live not far from this, correct. Have
you spoken to anyone that knew the Richens.
Speaker 7 (15:37):
Yeah? I spoke to somebody the other day at the
Memorial Day neighborhood party that mentioned that she was friends
with her and this was just a very huge surprise
to her friends because they did not see this monster,
(15:58):
a lurking beneath the surf, if you will.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
So they were surprised.
Speaker 7 (16:02):
They were surprised absolutely.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Okay, well, that's in direct contradiction to Eric Richard's family.
Take a listen to our cut twenty eight our friends
at NBC.
Speaker 4 (16:13):
Now, the family of the father of three is speaking out,
saying they've long been suspicious of his wife, Corey. Does
Eric's family believe Corey killed him?
Speaker 9 (16:24):
I think the family has always felt that Corey was
somehow involved in his death.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
The thirty three year old real estate agent turned children's
book author has been charged with his murder, police alleging
she poisoned her thirty nine year old husband last March
with a massive dose of fennol, and according to court documents,
Eric's family told investigators, it may not have been the
first time she poisoned him.
Speaker 9 (16:48):
He felt like Corey was trying to kill him and
that if he did die, that she should be investigated
for that.
Speaker 6 (16:55):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
So the family wasn't surprised at all, because, according to them,
this father of three thought his wife had long been
trying to kill him. But he would not accept that.
It was more like a joke to him. But as
we know, many a true word is spoken in jest,
(17:16):
alternately seriously telling his sister about what he perceived was
an attempt on his life while the family was vacationing
in Greece, and then hey, she's doing it for the money,
ha haha. You know, I've noticed Karen Stark's psychologists joining
us out of Manhattan that very often people joke about
(17:37):
things which are deadly serious, things that maybe even scary
to them. Is that just a way of dealing with fear.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
Well, exactly, Nancy. A lot of humor is based on
people being fad or fearful, and the way that they
can make it be okay is to lighten it up.
But I don't think that this man was actually thinking
it was funny. I think that he really understood that
(18:06):
she wanted him to be dead, that she had tried
to kill him. And I want to add that that
was not the first time.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Oh absolutely not. You know, I noticed something and I
don't know if you've noticed this in your death investigations.
Joe Scott Morgan with me is death investigator Joseph Scott
Morgan professor forensics at Jacksonville State University, author of Blood
Beneath My Feet on Amazon, and star of a hit
(18:35):
series and I mean a hit Body Bags with Joe
Scott Morgan, you and I together worked on the case
of Ellen Greenberg, a beautiful young teacher who was stabbed.
I believe it was twenty two times, mostly in the
back and the back of the head, in the back
of the neck, and her murder was ruled a suicide.
(18:59):
And I have been pushing that case since we heard
about it. When I visited her parents, Joe Scott, her
mother was very solemn, pleasant, but solemn because we were
talking about our daughter's murder. The father, who was a
(19:20):
really nice guy, kept cracking jokes the whole interview, and
a couple of times I had a barbed response because
I really think it was appropriate. But later I saw
him standing in the family kitchen and his eyes were
filled with tears. We went to, as you know, her
(19:43):
grave site, and the family told me that they had
not been to her grave site because it was so
quippling painful for them to have to see her grave
and deal with the fact that she's never ever coming home.
And I think, you know, I look back on him
(20:05):
cracking jokes and I wish I had not responded so harshly,
because I think it was his way. I mean, we
were going through the whole murder and what happened, and
how excited she was about her wedding, and I think
he was just that was his way of dealing with
our content.
Speaker 9 (20:24):
Joscott, you know, I've made, as I've told you before,
I've made probably in person, over two thousand death notifications
over the course of my career. I've seen people break
out in hysterical laughter when when I've notified them. And
you know, I don't like the term defense mechanism. It's
a reactionary thing though they don't know what to do
with these emotions at well up. And I can only
(20:45):
imagine in this particular case, where the family is is
actually you know, essentially hitting the chest with a ten
pound sledgehammer when they're made aware that there is apparently
a viper living among them. And I mean that in
the purest sense, because this guy was poisoned, Nancy. And
(21:07):
you know, in forensics, it's hard, particularly when you talk
about drug chemistries, for people to kind of grasp some numbers.
Just let me throw something out to you real quick. Okay,
if you if we go to the store and we
buy talanol, all right, talanol comes in like three hundred
and twenty five milligram tablets, right, and some people look
at him say, go, that's like a horse bill. You know,
you took this thing down. He was dosed with fentanyl,
(21:30):
a lethal dosage of fentanyl. Nancy. Now get this what
I say about talanol three hundred twenty five milligrams, right,
Fentanyl two milligrams is lethal. He was given ten times
out of mount I mean five times out of mount
per the medical examiner, and the medical examiner also determined.
Now I find this very intriguing. You know, fentanyl is
(21:53):
a Schedule too drug. You can actually be prescribed fentanyl,
but he determined the medical examiner determined that it was
actually illicit fentanyl.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Hey, before you go one more step, I've got a
question right there.
Speaker 6 (22:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Yeah, I knew that they had determined that this huge
fentanyl overdose that he received, we think in a Moscow
mule that she prepared for him, But I knew they
could determine that it was illicit. In other words, illegal
fentanyl was supposed to like a pain patch or appeal
that you get pursued to a doctor's prescription and you
pick it up at the pharmacy. How can you look
(22:27):
at it under a micro Well, they don't have a
microscope there. Weuld get of the pill itself. They had
to extract it from his body. How can you look
at it and tell when you're looking at let's just
say blood and say this is illegal fentanyl as supposed
to prescribed fentanyl.
Speaker 9 (22:45):
Let's say let's say that the illicit fentanyl, the illegal fentanyl,
was created in a lab and it was made in
tablet form, which many times it is, and it can
be in a liquid form too, but in a tablet
form when it's made in an hour actual legitimate pharmaceutical environment.
When they make the tablets, it's not pure fentanyl. It's
(23:06):
just like it's not pure talinol. They're binders in there,
and there are certain chemical signatures that you look for.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
When you say a binder, you mean like baking soda
or something like that to hold it together.
Speaker 9 (23:16):
Yeah, exactly. You know, we've we've had all kinds of
things over the years, Nancy. I mean people would cut drugs,
for instance, with like talcum powder, baby formula. Quinine has
been around for years and years. So if you get
these kind of weirdo, you know, signatures, chemical signatures, they're thinking, Okay,
we see the molecule for which which fentyl is a
synthetic opioid. You know, you think about heroin, which is
(23:39):
kind of naturally occurring, comes from the poppy plant. This
is something that synthesized, it's made in the lap. So
you're looking at this and you're thinking, oh my gosh,
you know this is something we see the the synthetic
molecule there, but there's all these weirdo attachments that are
there that shouldn't be there.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
So they can pick up those molecules. Even though they're
extracting the toxin from blood, they get some blood or
stomach contents.
Speaker 9 (24:04):
Uh, they're not well, not just that urine is a
fantastic sample to pull this from when we're looking for opioids.
You know, any kind of whether synthetic or naturally occurring,
and stomach contents are good and you know, with people
might not know this, but when you're at autopsy and
you open up the body, it's something if anybody's ever
(24:26):
smelled someone in the morning after they've had a big
drunk on the night before. You can smell alcohol on
that person when you open up the body. If they
have alcohol board, even if it's just a slight amount,
it'll knock you to your knees. Many times. At autopsy,
you know that alcohol's there, and within the stomach content,
you can actually pull out a sample of that. You
(24:47):
can spin it down, and you can actually test that substance.
And sometimes that's the only thing we have to hang
our hat on.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Well, you say spin it down, you mean separate the
urine from the toxin.
Speaker 9 (24:56):
Yeah, well, yeah, no, I'm referring to the gastric content.
So you to kind of separate.
Speaker 1 (25:01):
Spin it down means you separate the gas contents. Yeah,
liquid from the toxic.
Speaker 9 (25:06):
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And so that's what they'll do in
the laboratory. And there's there's any number of ways we
can go. And here's one more fascinating thing. I'll shut
my mouth.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
Now, please don't. It is actually fascinating.
Speaker 9 (25:15):
If they drew, If they drew vitreous fluid, which you
know we always do from the eye. Vitreous fluid is
very non specific. It's like looking at the rings on
a tree. You know, you can kind of get an
idea when there were drought, when there's a drought and
there's a rainy year, and that's where think if you
look at that analogy with virtuous fluid, you get a
qualifying amount. You say, Okay, well something has been here before,
(25:40):
all right. If they drew virtuous fluid, I'd be really
interested to see if they found it, because it takes
a lot longer for it to kind of settle into
the vitreous virtuous layer. I'd be very curious if they
found it in there, which would give you an idea.
You know, Karen mentioned a moment ago that he had
been dosed before, and that was on I think the
(26:01):
February fourteenth. She fixed him a sandwich. And what was interesting,
you know, how you reacted to that means he had
difficulty breathing, which is something that you see with opioid ods.
You know, they'll they'll become a congested, highly congested in
the face. You'll have individuals that have difficulty breathing. He
had difficulty breathing at that point time, but it kind
(26:23):
of resolves. So you know, what if just what if
that was a test run and then she said, Okay,
well I gave him this amount this time, it didn't work,
and by golly, I'm going to give him twice that
amount this time, and that maybe what happened, you know, And.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
All I asked him, what did I add? I'm so
I don't even know what the question was anymore. But
I have another question for you, Joe, Scott Morgan, and
for anybody else on this panel. The texts regard I'm
back on the party. Yeah, I'm not letting it go.
I want to find out when she texted her friends,
(26:59):
what did she say in the text Some of those,
if not all of them, were deleted, along with whomever
she was texting during the night where she said her
phone was plugged in in the bedroom with her husband
and not being used and turned off. There was activity,
the phone was moving, it was being locked and unlocked,
(27:20):
and texts were sent and received throughout the evening.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
They're deleted. Here's the question.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
I know we can recover a lot of information from
the cloud that stores all of your information.
Speaker 2 (27:36):
What about texts? Are they stored?
Speaker 1 (27:41):
Can we reconstruct the texts that she deleted? And it
leads me to Jarrett Fiorentino veteran trial lawyer, guilty conscience.
Speaker 2 (27:53):
Again, I don't.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Even know what I've ever deleted a text ever, because
that requires time. But you don't have any of that.
So why would she go to the trouble of deleting
text and can I recover them?
Speaker 5 (28:05):
Well, a couple of things. She's lying about having the
phone at the point, so she's definitely wanting to hide
the fact that she was using her phone. If you
delete texts, they are difficult to recover, believe it or not,
They're not always recoverable. What I've done, and what's done
in other investigations is you can reverse engineer this.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
The record will.
Speaker 5 (28:26):
Reveal who exactly she was texting. You can bet the
investigators are going to follow up with those individuals and say, hey,
we have a record that you were texting with Corey
that night, show us the text and you can reverse
engineer the conversation that way.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
What if they have deleted the text.
Speaker 5 (28:45):
If your only hope then, Nancy, is they're stored somewhere
in the cloud or in the depths of the phone.
And it's not always the case with text.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
See.
Speaker 5 (28:56):
The thing about a phone is it stores so much
information and it's so crazy these cases that it's often
being rewritten. It's just very hard to recreate that kind
of data. It's just not because there are so many
texts going back and forth, all of those records aren't
maintained for an extended period of time. That's where you
run into difficulty.
Speaker 1 (29:15):
Well, one thing that's interesting a lot of people are
comparing this case to the Alex Murlock double murder, the
legal heir in South Carolina that is now convicted of
murdering wife Maggie and son Paul. Their texts, phone calls,
even video scent around the time of the murders were
(29:36):
used at trial, but they had not been deleted, which
is very different from this case.
Speaker 6 (29:43):
Nancy, I don't want to interrupt you, but can I
praise do?
Speaker 7 (29:46):
Okay?
Speaker 1 (29:46):
Yes.
Speaker 6 (29:47):
On the night that Eric died after she poised, After
she allegedly poisoned him, she claimed her phone didn't move,
that she'd know right there plugged in. They were able
to prove obviously that it wasn't plugged in, that it
was moving. It had been unlocked and unlocked several times
during the time where she said she wasn't on it.
What they did find is that she had been texting
(30:08):
her best somebody they labeled the best friend who didn't
live nearby, lived some ways away. She's called cl in
some of the paperwork, and she actually had Corey had
her friend that she was texting with that night delete
their text messages, and that came up during the investigation.
(30:30):
When this person admitted to police that she had been
texting with Corey at that time of night, they said, hey,
let us see the text. She pulls out her cellphone,
hands it to him to go for it. All the
texts between her and Corey were deleted. There were plenty
of other texts on the phone, but her communication with
Corey that night all deleted.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Okay, I like it. Listen, always jump in, Dave mac.
It's like when somebody calls the last minute and says
they're coming to dinner. You go, oh great, I'll just
add more water to the soup. Place. Just keep pouring
it in, keep pouring it in, because every fact counts.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
Time stories with Nancy Grace.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
I want to point out another striking characteristic of the
data analysis. I don't know if the name Richard Debate
rings a bell, because I can never forget him. He
murdered his wife he claimed that an unknown intruder masked.
They're always masked. Remember Jody Area is Joskotte Morgan. She
(31:45):
said that two masked ninjas broke into Travis Alexander's condo,
murdered him and let her run free. Always a mask right,
So in debates case, he says a masked ruder broke
him and murdered his wife and basically did nothing to him. Okay,
(32:10):
The fitbit data on the wife's watch showed her walking
around the house long after he said she was dead,
So his stories a lie. Then I analyzed a case.
I think her name was Kelly Heron, Kelly Heron, and
(32:31):
she was jogging in Seattle and fought off an attacker
and all of the movements to corroborate her story were
caught on her fitbit. It was amazing. Same thing here
regarding the fund And I'm just wondering if she had
a fitbit or an Apple watch, they could also corroborate
(32:53):
the police theory that she was not asleep in her
son's room down the hall, that she was back and
forth moving. And we also saw in the Alex Murdoye
prosecution how many times his phone was locked and unlocked,
and we saw how many times even his door to
his suburban vehicle were opened and closed based on NAB
(33:17):
navigation data. It's amazing. So I expect that to be
a huge part of this trial. But earlier Karen Stark
brought up a fact that I find really convincing, and
that fact is that very shortly after her husband's death,
the wife in this case, Corey Richins, has a locksmith
(33:38):
come and drill into her husband's safe. Now, a lot
of women may be widows, be they male or female,
may be thinking about, oh, my goodness, I've got to
prepare the funeral, what is my spouse going to wear?
How am I going to tell all the relatives what's happened?
(34:00):
And I can't stand the thought of going through this.
But Corey Richards was of a much sturdier ilk, and
she thought to call a locksmith to come to the home.
Take a listen to our cut thirty two our friends
at ABC four.
Speaker 10 (34:15):
It's the case that just keeps unfolding. Corey has been
charged with one count of aggravated murder and three counts
of possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute.
Here's what's been amended on those charges. We've now learned
that after her husband Eric's death on March fourth, Corey
hired a locksmith to open Eric's safe containing between one
hundred and twenty five and one hundred.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
And sixty five thousand dollars.
Speaker 10 (34:37):
Eric's sister told Corey she didn't have the rights to
those funds, resulting in Corey punching her. Eric also opened
a living trust and placed the trust as his life
insurance beneficiary instead of Corey. We also now know that
Corey had purchased at least four life insurance policies on
Eric richins with death benefits.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
Of over a million dollars. That has a lot of information.
Us here one more time, our friends at ABC four.
Speaker 10 (35:03):
It's the case that just keeps unfolding. Corey has been
charged with one count of aggravated murder and three counts
of possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute.
Here's what's been amended on those charges. We've now learned
that after her husband Eric's death on March fourth, Corey
hired a locksmith to open Eric's safe containing between one
hundred and twenty five and one hundred and.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
Sixty five thousand dollars.
Speaker 10 (35:24):
Eric's sister told Corey she didn't have the rights to
those funds, resulting in Corey punching her. Eric also opened
a living trust and placed the trust as his life
insurance beneficiary instead of Corey. We also now know that
Corey had purchased at least four life insurance policies on
Eric ritchins with death benefits of over a million dollars.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Okay, this is what jumps out at me in a
probative manner. In other words, can I use it to
prove something at trial? Immediately following her husband's death, she's
not planning the funeral, notifying relatives. She's hiring a locksmith
to drill into her husband's safe to get out about
one hundred and sixty five thousand dollars in cash. Her
(36:06):
husband's sister said, whoa wait, wait, you don't have a
right to that money. And what does she do? She
punches her sister in law, punches her, I believe in
the face. We also learn that the deceased husband, Eric Richards,
opened a living trust and placed the trust as his
(36:30):
life insurance beneficiary to a sister, not his wife. We
also know that the widow the merry widow Corey Richins,
purchased four life insurance policies on her husband with death
benefits millions of dollars. Okay, all of that is probative
(36:54):
to Justin Boardman joining me former detective West Valley City PD,
now running Boardman Training and consultant. And this is his jurisdiction.
Which one of those do you want to take a
crack at first?
Speaker 7 (37:09):
Wow? Probably the life insurance policy. You know, usually, and well,
at least in my cases, I've had to have, like
when I took out a life insurance policy on a
wife or something like that, I've had to notify them
(37:32):
that it was being done. And that doesn't seem like
that was the case. So that's certainly something that sticks
out to me.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
Right. In other words, her taking a life insurance policy
and her husband was not unusual, but the fact that
she took out four and failed to notify him as
is customary suggests a nefarious motive. And I got to
tell you this, Justin, if my husband takes out four
brand new life insurance policies on me, I'm calling his mother,
(38:06):
even if I had to do it through seance in
reporting him. She's the only person he's ever been the
least bit afraid of. So I'm gonna have to call
for Heavenly aid on that for life insurance policies, and
doesn't notify him because we see him changing the beneficiary
from her to somebody else because he's afraid.
Speaker 7 (38:25):
Absolutely, and obviously he was thinking that this might this
might turn into this homicide, you know, certainly like with Josh.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Powell and Susan Susan Powell in.
Speaker 7 (38:40):
Case, I worked the outskirts of a little bit out
of my former jurisdiction where she left a note saying
that if I ended up dead, this is who probably
did it, pointing to her husband.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
And he was never arrested for a murder and her
body has never been found, so there's definitely a trail
being left. I find the greed aspect overwhelming that she
was hiring a locksmith while she could have been planning
not a party, but gathering after the funeral, or her
(39:18):
words at the funeral. Karen Stark, Well.
Speaker 3 (39:23):
It's not only that, Nancy, I mean, think think of
everything that we're talking about. I mean, here she's attacking
her sister in law for telling her.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
Now it's my next thing, Karen Stark. I believe you've
met on the set a couple of times. My sister's
in law, jan and Donna, and I got to tell
you how blessed I was never a crossword ever. And
this woman is punching the sister in law.
Speaker 3 (39:56):
The just picture that her husband is dead, she's supposed
to be grieving, and just the idea of punching her
sister in law when you don't actually see people walking
around and punching their family in the face. And then
none of that shows signs of someone who's distraught. There's
(40:18):
nothing distraught about her. And one of the other things
that she did, which hasn't been mentioned yet, Nancy, is
that she changed his life insurance policies without him knowing
that he was doing with his partner.
Speaker 1 (40:34):
And he finds out and changes it back. Right, he
should have said a chill down his spine. But I'm
back on okay. Two things. The hiring a locksmith. I
mean she's not trying to find an organist for the wedding,
I mean that organist for the funeral. Instead, she's hiring
(40:54):
a locksmith to get that cash.
Speaker 3 (40:58):
You set a wedding for a reason, nance, Yeah, yeah,
you're right. Your reason you made that mistakes. That's definitely
a Freudian slipp It's because she was acting more like
it was a celebration than it was the funeral.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
You're so right, Karen Stark. And you know, back to
the timeline. I know nobody is taking the bait on
my party theory. But what did she go to the
liquor store and buy the booze and get the food ready?
I mean, she's having a celebration. She might as well
(41:32):
just dance across his grave.
Speaker 6 (41:35):
One of the things about the party aspect that has
bothered me immenseally is who has friends that would come
over and participate in a loud drinking party the day
after their friend's husband died.
Speaker 1 (41:48):
Well, let me ask you this, who do you think
that Corey Richins is hanging out with nuns and priests
and virgins? You know, I'm sure they were all on
her side.
Speaker 9 (41:57):
Nancy. I have an idea who might be coming to
that partar someone that is mentioned in these texts. It's
rather cryptic and we don't know their name yet, but
their initials are C. L. And that's the individual that
supplied her with the fentanyl. And the police know who
this individual is and so this transaction, and they they
(42:18):
frame the transaction when she purchased these illicit substances from
this individual as a hand to hand try and transaction.
That's the way the police frame this. So I'm thinking,
you know, going to you know, to your train of
thought here, who's showing up? Who in the heck is
she associating with in this world in which she endwelled?
Speaker 1 (42:40):
And Joe Scott Morgan, I'm very disappointed. I thought you
party people at Jacksonville State University throw a party. Of course,
you have to invite your dope dealer guys. If you
have any information regarding the death, the painful death of
the father of these three little boys, Eric Richards, please
(43:05):
call four three, five, six one five thirty six hundred. Goodbye,
said
Host
Nancy Grace
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