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PARK CITY — Kouri Richins, a woman charged with murdering her husband, appeared virtually from jail Tuesday in the Summit County Justice Court to address prosecutors' claims that she did not follow through with the terms of her plea in a separate domestic violence case.
Richins, 33, was charged with assault, a class B misdemeanor on June 9, 2022. The incident cited in the charges happened three days after her husband's death in March 2022.
Richin's sister-in-law, Amy Richins, testified that she went to the home of her brother, Eric Richins, shortly after he died and discovered that Kouri Richins had hired a locksmith to break into Eric Richins' safe. She asked her sister-in-law why she hadn't just asked her father-in-law for the code and Kouri Richins' response was screaming and telling Amy Richins to get out of her house. She said she was punched in the face and neck by Kouri Richins.
"I will never forget the look in her eyes when she attacked me that Sunday morning. ... It took four people to pull her off me that day," Amy Richins testified.
Kouri Richins pleaded no contest to the charge on Feb. 14, 2023, as part of a plea in abeyance and was given 90 days to complete a thinking errors class or grief counseling and until Jan. 14, 2024, to pay $1,105 to the court.
Deputy Summit County attorney Bradley Bloodworth said Richins had not completed either of the requirements, but Summit County Justice Court Judge Brendan McCullagh said the payment would have been put on hold when she was incarcerated for her aggravated murder charge.
Because she entered a plea as a plea in abeyance, the charge will be dismissed if the court determines she has followed the terms. If not, she will be convicted of the misdemeanor.
Defense attorney Skye Lazaro assured the judge that Richins did complete grief counseling but did not get a report. A week before the deadline to submit that report, she was charged with murdering her husband and taken into custody.
The attorney filed an invoice on Tuesday from Acceptance Counseling showing Richins attended counseling after her husband's death and before the misdemeanor charge was filed, but not afterward.
The court scheduled an evidentiary hearing on May 13.
Richins was arrested on May 8, 2023, over a year after her husband's death, and charged with aggravated murder, a first-degree felony; and three counts of drug possession with intent to distribute, a second-degree felony.
A toxicology report showed Eric Richins died with five times the lethal dosage of fentanyl in his system, but search warrant affidavits said there was no indication that he was a drug user.
After her husband's death, Richins wrote a book about helping children deal with grief.
