00:00:00
Tonight on Dateline. You took a innocent mom away from her babies, and this means war.
00:00:06
I'm ready to get this one heck of a fight. Something's done with Eric! Corey says she went into the master bedroom.
00:00:13
He's cold, he doesn't have a pulse. Eric died in his sleep. He seemed like a healthy guy.
00:00:18
Strong as an ox. She was a mess, just shattered. Corey wrote a book for kids on coping with grief.
00:00:25
We think here she is trying to help other families. I thought, wow, that's wonderful.
00:00:30
The results of the toxicology come back and it's stunning. Eric has fentanyl in his body.
00:00:36
More than five times a lethal amount. People have skeletons in their closet. Eric and Corey both have secrets.
00:00:44
You were keeping from each other. Did you feel that she loved you? Yeah, yeah, I think she did.
00:00:50
We see a whole other side that we didn't know about. Sex, greed, lust, secrets. Money.
00:00:57
There's so many layers to it. That's what blows my mind. A young widow wrote the book on grief, but was she grieving or scheming?
00:01:10
I'm Lester Holt, and this is Dateline. Here's Andrea Canning with Book of Lies. There are times in life when we all deal with grief, but some losses cut deeper than others.
00:01:38
When a 39-year-old father died suddenly, his widow set out to help their three young sons make sense of it.
00:01:47
She published a book called Are You With Me? about a father who becomes a guardian angel.
00:01:53
Talking about loss with kids can be a tricky subject. Then she went on a local TV show to share it with the world.
00:01:59
My kids and I kind of wrote this book on the different emotions and grieving processes that we've experienced last year.
00:02:08
Before that awful loss, it seemed Eric and Corey Richens led a charmed life. A beautiful couple. They both looked very successful. They looked very happy together.
00:02:19
Raising their boys in this idyllic place surrounded by mountains just outside of Park City, Utah.
00:02:26
But things aren't always as they seem. You're a TV lifestyle host who's now in the middle of a murder investigation.
00:02:33
It's crazy. This is the most surreal thing that has happened in my career. How did this happen to a normal mom having a really good life?
00:02:43
How did it get from there to here? It all began on March 4th, 2022, with a pre-dawn call to 911.
00:02:56
Okay, tell me, Xabi, what happened? I don't know. I was sleeping with my kids. Corey Richens told the dispatcher she'd woken up to find her husband, Eric, not breathing.
00:03:08
He just called. Who's called? My husband. First responders arrived at the house on Willow Court ten minutes later.
00:03:16
What's your first name? That's what happened today. He was just fine. He was fine.
00:03:24
Corey told deputies she had already tried CPR. Paramedics continued those life-saving efforts.
00:03:35
Reporter Shelby Lofton covered the story for NBC affiliate KSL. They're doing what they can, but the efforts are failing.
00:03:44
And so the bedroom is loud and chaotic. There's a lot of people in there. But it doesn't look like this is a man whose life can be saved.
00:03:53
Father and local businessman Eric Richens was pronounced dead at the scene. Deputies asked Corey about their night.
00:04:01
What time did you see him when he was alert? We had a drink together at nine to celebrate something at work tomorrow.
00:04:10
Okay. What does Corey say happened that night? Corey says that the night Eric died, they decided to have a Moscow mule and a lemon drum.
00:04:20
She told the deputies after the two drinks. She and Eric turned in for the night.
00:04:31
Nate Eaton followed the story for East Idaho News. One of their sons was having a rough night having nightmares, so she went to lie down with him.
00:04:40
She stayed in his bed, likely fell asleep for some time. I just woke up. When I sleep with my kids, I wake up and I go back to my own bed.
00:04:49
and I just crawled over on his side. And he was laying in bed? He was on his back on the bed.
00:05:00
And then she realized something wasn't right. He wasn't snoring. Normally he snored.
00:05:05
She jumped out of bed, she turned on the light, he doesn't have a pulse. Corey called her mom, Lisa Darden, with the horrible news.
00:05:13
Mom, mom, who's in my house? When Lisa got there, she wondered if Eric's recent allergy shots had something to do with his death.
00:05:26
Soon, they got word to Corey's older brother, DJ. How do you get the news that Eric has died?
00:05:52
My mom called me that morning to let me know and then I jumped in the car and headed down there immediately That such you know just shocking news When someone is that age so young to just die in the middle of the night
00:06:10
Yeah. It's not normal. It's not. Oh my God, I've got to breathe. I just talked to him like a couple of hours ago.
00:06:19
When Eric's sister Katie arrived, Corey told her what she had told deputies. And I just turned over to pedal and his body was just so cold.
00:06:29
As Eric's family and friends struggled with his loss, they could not have known the saga of Eric and Corey Richens would take years to untangle.
00:06:39
The betrayal here is remarkable and unique. Something was about to happen that would rock your family to its core.
00:06:48
It did. I can't even describe it. I mean, who whoever sees that coming? It's one of those stories that has sex, greed, lust, secrets.
00:06:58
Right. Money. The first thing I thought about when I heard this story was, this is going to be on Dateline. I know it is.
00:07:08
My house is active. He didn't just die in his sleep. This is insane. By morning, the paramedics and deputies had packed up and left the Richens' house.
00:07:35
In small-town Camas, Utah, the sad news traveled fast. At the Mirror Lake Diner, the breakfast rush was in full swing
00:07:44
when owner Gabe Morin first heard about his friend. Who called you with the news?
00:07:49
My wife. That's a shocker when, you know, you just don't ever expect to get news like that.
00:07:56
He seemed like a healthy guy, right? Young, vibrant. Strong as an ox. It sounded like natural causes and very unexpected.
00:08:05
Eric always seemed the picture of good health. Gabe says he loved outdoor sports, especially snowmobiling.
00:08:12
We're snowmobiling at 11,000 feet. He's not having any problems. He's not short of breath.
00:08:17
He's in very strong, good shape. You saw Eric the day he died. Yeah, that morning he came in and had his chicken fried steak.
00:08:27
We chatted for a bit. Everything was normal. How did he look physically to you when he was here?
00:08:33
Yeah, healthy, normal. Less than 24 hours later, he's gone. Corey's brother, DJ, arrived from Wyoming to console his sister.
00:08:43
I mean, Corey was, I'll say, a puddle in a corner. It's like every time he turned around, she's just bawling her eyes out.
00:08:49
You know, there was a few of us there that were kind of keeping the boys preoccupied.
00:08:54
And your heart is obviously breaking for Corey and for your three nephews. Yes, yeah. I mean, and he was a good friend of mine, you know, so as soon as I got the news, I broke down.
00:09:06
Eric and his two sisters were raised in a tight-knit family. He was particularly close with his father, Gene, who taught him the value of hard work at the family's cattle ranch.
00:09:17
During college, Eric took on some masonry work. It was on one of those jobs that he met Corey at the Home Depot.
00:09:23
She worked there part-time between college classes. She was a darling, sociable, just nice, cute, bubbly, very smart, I thought.
00:09:34
Linda King worked alongside Corey at the registers. I was always like the mother hen.
00:09:39
You know how guys can get. Were the guys interested in Corey then? Almost every one of them were.
00:09:46
Yeah. Sometimes she'd get a little scared, you know, so I'd have to walk over there and tell them, come on over to my register, you know, and deal with mama over here, you know, so they would, you know.
00:09:56
You're like her protector. I was. Linda did approve of one customer who took an interest in Corey.
00:10:02
Why was Eric your favorite customer? He just had the best personality. He had the laugh.
00:10:10
Oh, the laugh. Yeah. Corey liked him too. She goes, I like him, you know. And it didn't take very long, and they were going out on a date.
00:10:23
This is like out of a rom-com, you know, meeting at Home Depot. Oh, yeah. She's working there, he comes in.
00:10:28
Yes. And they were on the fast track. Within a few months, Corey moved in with Eric.
00:10:34
And soon, she was expecting a baby boy. She was excited to be a mom. Was that always something she wanted to do?
00:10:41
Over the moon. And I didn't know that so much until she had her first son, and that was her life calling, was to be a mom.
00:10:49
They eventually married, and Eric started his own masonry business with his best friend.
00:10:54
They did rock on these beautiful, beautiful homes here in Park City. I mean, gorgeous, 20,000 square foot homes.
00:11:02
I've seen some of Eric's work. Yes. It's beautiful. Yes. I mean, their work is incredible, but Eric had such a drive and a direction that I think really propelled that company.
00:11:14
And gave Eric financial independence to buy that spacious five-bedroom home. A good thing, because soon the couple would welcome two more sons.
00:11:23
Life was good for Corey and Eric and the boys. Yes. Yeah, it was. It really was.
00:11:30
According to Corey, it was a much more stable life than she knew as a child. Corey did not have the best of childhoods.
00:11:38
Her father served time in prison, and she says that by the time she was a teenager,
00:11:43
she had lived to two dozen places, that they had moved all over the place. For us, to stay in one spot for three, four months was saying a lot.
00:11:50
We would move quite a bit. It was probably different than most kids grow up, obviously.
00:11:55
DJ says his sister was driven As a teenager Corey worked for her aunt cleaning business helping care for some of Park City most lavish homes Now with her new life she wasn interested in cleaning houses
00:12:07
Corey wanted to flip them and get in on the booming real estate market. Corey's good friend, Greg Hall, who owns a marketing company,
00:12:15
helped her get the word out. Her house flipping, is it like HGTV? Yeah, kind of.
00:12:21
She would find something that she felt that she could buy at the right price, and fix it up and flip it and make a profit.
00:12:29
By 2022, the couple was bringing in significant money. And between three kids and two careers, their lives were constantly in motion.
00:12:38
Busy. Busy, busy. Soccer. I mean, soccer was Eric's passion, but it was also the boys.
00:12:45
And they gave back to the community a lot. I mean, they were busy. And Corey was working on the biggest deal of her career,
00:12:51
the purchase of a 20,000-square-foot home she called the Midway Mansion. This estate was quite something.
00:12:59
It was an unfinished house in the middle of this beautiful valley surrounded by our gorgeous snow-capped mountains.
00:13:06
That's a massive deal. This wasn't just something that was pennies. This was millions of dollars to buy.
00:13:14
And then, in the middle of all that, Corey got COVID and Eric suddenly fell ill.
00:13:20
And he gets really, really sick on Valentine's Day, to the point that he has to lie down and take a nap in the middle of the day.
00:13:28
That is not Eric. Eric does not stop. He's not going to lay down for 90 minutes on a weekday and have a nap,
00:13:35
because he doesn't feel well. Eric told a friend he thought it might have been an allergic reaction to a sandwich he ate.
00:13:42
After using an EpiPen, he felt better. But perhaps it was a warning sign of things to come,
00:13:47
because two weeks after that, Eric was dead. A deputy at the scene told Corey there would be an autopsy.
00:13:53
Because he was in good health and his age and everything like that, our medical examiner is going to come and do their investigation real quick
00:14:02
and then also our detective just to make sure that everything is documented correctly.
00:14:11
As Eric's body went off to the medical examiner's office, his family made funeral arrangements.
00:14:17
And Corey was about to discover that her husband had been keeping a secret. I mean, when you're told your husband just died, this is no longer your house,
00:14:26
there's probably going to be an altercation. And there was. Eric's three young boys were now fatherless.
00:14:46
Overnight, they'd lost their protector, their best friend. Your heart must have broken for those boys.
00:14:51
Oh, absolutely. Yeah, I mean, to lose it, I lost my dad when I was 20. For these kids to lose their dad in, you know, what, seven years old, ten years old?
00:15:02
I mean, that's crazy. That's terrible. How are the boys handling it? I don't think for them at their age that it had actually clicked in their mind what had just happened.
00:15:11
Corey's friend Greg Hall says she lost the love of her life. How was she doing? She was a mess. She was just shattered. It completely destroyed her.
00:15:23
But as Corey grieved in those early days, she also started getting Eric's affairs in order.
00:15:28
There was a safe in the garage that she was trying to get in and call the locksmith to open up the safe.
00:15:34
And Eric's sister arrived and said, hold on, you can't go in the safe. And then the sister, Amy, dropped a bombshell.
00:15:42
She told Corey that Eric's other sister, Katie, was in charge of his estate and that the house didn't even belong to Corey.
00:15:49
And that situation did not end well. Yeah. Amy said that Corey did end up punching her and the police were called to the home.
00:15:55
I mean, when you're told, you know, your husband just died and you're told this is no longer your house,
00:16:01
there's probably going to be an altercation. And there was. There was a little bit of pushing.
00:16:07
I got between them. Oh, you were there. I was there. Once I was between them, obviously they're both throwing over the top of me.
00:16:18
How mad was Corey when she realized what was really happening? The police took her upstairs into Eric's office in the garage area.
00:16:27
And they actually put Katie's attorney on the phone with Corey so she could pretty much explain to Corey that, you know, nothing belongs to Corey at this point.
00:16:40
So I think, you know, she was obviously pretty upset with that. A year and a half before he died, while the couple was going through a rough patch,
00:16:48
Eric had secretly gone to an estate planner to set up a trust. He put his sister Katie in charge.
00:16:54
The trust states that in the event of Eric's death, Corey would be provided for,
00:16:59
but everything else, all other assets, would go to their sons. Those are big steps that he took, creating this trust, putting it in his sister's name.
00:17:09
Right. He took big steps before he died and then telling his family that, listen, you're going to be the owner of the trust, but don't tell her.
00:17:18
If Corey was surprised, perhaps she shouldn't have been. The Richens family had always been protective of Eric's assets.
00:17:26
Did Corey ever confide in you about some of the things with Eric's family? The only thing that she ever did tell me was that the prenup was signed five minutes before she walked down the aisle.
00:17:39
She was in her wedding dress, ready to go through the doors, down the aisle, and then it was presented to her.
00:17:43
That's a tough thing on your wedding day. Yeah, I think that would be kind of, you wouldn't expect that.
00:17:47
It was pretty much an ultimatum to her that either sign it or we're not getting married.
00:17:52
Well, here she is holding the baby at that point. Obviously she going to sign it Now with her world falling apart Corey called Eric best friend to vent Her friend recorded the call They taking my f house right
00:18:06
This is my f***ing house. I thought the house was going to stay with people no matter what.
00:18:11
No. The house goes to the trust's name, which goes to Katie. She has the right to sell it.
00:18:18
She has the right to remodel it. She has the right to do whatever. I have no rights to the house.
00:18:23
so to speak of the trust but eric would always say that you are his wife you're the mother of
00:18:29
his children he loves you right and so he would do anything for you and those three boys i know
00:18:35
eric was still here today he would say no i need cory to be protected but unfortunately he didn't
00:18:44
set her up that way i just want my house and my stuff in my house that me and eric bought i just
00:18:49
want my house. They can have all the money. They can have all the money. A week after he died,
00:18:56
with family tensions running high, Eric's loved ones gathered for his funeral. You were so close with Eric that you were a pallbearer at his funeral.
00:19:07
It was a very sad service. Eric's friend Gabe sensed something else. There was a weird tension about the funeral, and I just thought it was odd.
00:19:18
Whatever was happening between Corey and her in-laws seemed to be on display. Corey's name wasn't even mentioned at the service.
00:19:25
There was a lot of talk about Eric and the boys and Eric and the boys and nothing about Corey.
00:19:32
And still, there was that lingering question on everyone's mind. How did Eric die?
00:19:37
Paramedics at the scene wondered if his sudden death could have been the result of a burst artery, an aneurysm.
00:19:43
I wonder if he had an aneurysm or something with all the blood. pretty young. Yeah.
00:19:51
When the Emmy completed the autopsy, she noted there were small nodules on Eric's lungs.
00:19:56
He did have COVID when he died. They did find signs of COVID in his system, but they said that did not contribute to his death at all.
00:20:05
So what had killed Eric? It would take a few more weeks for the toxicology results to come back.
00:20:11
Finally, there would be some real answers, but not the ones anyone expected. It's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, what's going on here? You know, that's the last thing you'd expect with Eric.
00:20:39
In the days that followed Eric Richen's death, Nearly everyone who knew him asked the same question.
00:20:48
How could a seemingly healthy 39-year-old suddenly die in his sleep? There were multiple stories around town about how Eric might have died.
00:20:59
And it all started actually from the night that EMTs responded. On body camera footage, we hear some of them wondering, how did this healthy young dad die?
00:21:09
My husband acted. He didn't just die in his sleep. This is insane. Any mental health conditions?
00:21:19
No. Okay. How about any suicidal history? No. Never. No. A month later, there was an answer.
00:21:30
Former homicide detective Wayne Nichols reviewed the case for Dateline. The results of the toxicology come back weeks later.
00:21:38
Yes. And it's stunning to a lot of people in Eric's world. It absolutely is. It's pretty evident that Eric has fentanyl in his body, which is an absolute game changer for this investigation.
00:21:55
Fentanyl is 50 times stronger than heroin. It's a painkiller that some abuse because of its intense high.
00:22:03
Any history of prescription abuse? No. I mean, no, when he was in high school and stuff, yeah.
00:22:11
Okay. At the time of Eric's death, paramedics suspected he may have taken drugs, so they administered Narcan, but it had no effect.
00:22:21
No pulse or anything? No, no, he was cold. What made it even harder to fathom was the amount of fentanyl found in Eric's system.
00:22:30
He had a lot, a significant amount of fentanyl in his body, more than five times what is considered a lethal amount of fentanyl.
00:22:42
And the Emmy confirmed the fentanyl was street-made, not prescription-grade. Eric is a dad. He's a businessman.
00:22:50
He wasn't really known as some type of drug user in the community. What does law enforcement do with that, when that's sort of the bio you've been given about Eric Richens?
00:23:01
People have skeletons in their closet. Sometimes people are hiding the pain that they're really in, and they cope with that, with drugs or alcohol.
00:23:11
Eric's friend Gabe couldn't believe it. I heard it was a brain aneurysm, and then we're hearing fentanyl and overdose,
00:23:17
and it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, what's going on here? And, you know, that's the last thing you'd expect with Eric.
00:23:26
What did you think when you heard fentanyl was the cause of death? Accidental. I mean, we all knew Eric kind of liked to party.
00:23:35
You know, he was the life of the party wherever he went. But, you know, so I would think accidental, 100%.
00:23:43
Does he have any history of illicit drug use or anything in the past year? No, no, no, whatever.
00:23:49
Corey told deputies they had both taken marijuana edibles in the past. We eat gummy. Sometimes we go to the gummies before he goes to bed.
00:24:00
It didn't seem like you did though. It's like a gummy as in like a THC gummy. Okay.
00:24:11
Is there any possibility of THC gummies being laced with fentanyl? Anything is possible when it comes to the world of illicit drugs.
00:24:20
You know, with THC gummies though now being so normal, I think law enforcement is going to be able to discount that theory
00:24:27
very, very early on in the investigation. The toxicology report jump-started the investigation, sending law enforcement back to the Richens' home.
00:24:37
And this time they come armed with search warrants. Is there any evidence left behind that they can figure out what happened to Eric?
00:24:47
And that also includes seizing cell phones and other electronic devices belonging to the family.
00:24:53
That included taking the family's iPad and Corey's phone, hoping they'd offer clues.
00:24:59
They never found any trace of fentanyl in the house. Now you could argue that it never was in the home, or was it flushed down the toilet, or was it thrown out in the garbage?
00:25:08
Or did the police just never find it? Or did the police just never find it? From what we can infer, the experts don't know how Eric had that fentanyl and how it got into his body.
00:25:22
Hey, this is Corey Ritchens. Hey, I just have some quick questions for you. Months later, Corey was back on the phone, recording more calls.
00:25:31
I'm just trying to understand the toxicology report, and I promise I won't take up a ton of your time.
00:25:36
Oh, you're fine. You're fine. This time asking the medical examiner if he knew how the fentanyl got into her husband's system.
00:25:43
So does this tell you, like, if he, if it was, like, injected, if he ate it, if, I mean, is that what this, can you tell from this report?
00:25:54
Not definitively. I mean, it seems like, you know, with what the amount that's there that it probably was ingested, you know, probably taken by mouth.
00:26:02
OK, so the 15 NG, like, is that like a substantial amount? Is that like a trace?
00:26:08
That's a lot. That's a lot of fentanyl in the blood. Then the conversation turned to the source of the fentanyl.
00:26:14
It's a variant of fentanyl that is usually only present in the setting of illicitly manufactured fentanyl.
00:26:25
Illicitly manufactured like a pharmacy? No, no, no. Like, a lot of, most fentanyl that we see that, you know, ends up people,
00:26:34
leading people to die these days is related to, you know, fentanyl that's manufactured by drug
00:26:42
cartels as opposed to by pharmaceutical companies. Oh, good Lord. Do you have any indication he was
00:26:47
abusing fentanyl? No, that's why all of this is just like, what the heck is this? It was all so
00:26:55
tragic, but Corey was ready for a fresh start and a new venture. You know, I just watched the
00:27:01
struggle that my kids were going through. Her story would get people talking, just not in the
00:27:07
way she expected. I checked my Facebook inbox and it said, you need to investigate your children's
00:27:14
book. Author, did you know that she is a suspect in the murder of her husband? As the first anniversary of her husband's death approached,
00:27:35
Corrie channeled her grief into a new project, a self-published children's book called Are You With Me?
00:27:42
Her friend Greg Hall watched it take shape. She did it as a tribute to her children and to give them a memory,
00:27:51
and for other children that have been through this. Her boys were surely struggling. How could they not be?
00:27:56
Correct. That's correct. And she wanted to comfort them. And I thought it was a good thing.
00:28:01
All she was trying to do was find a way that kind of helped the boys cope with it.
00:28:05
To help promote her book, Corey went on the Salt Lake City talk show, Good Things Utah.
00:28:12
So my husband passed away unexpectedly last year. So it's March 4th was a one-year anniversary for us.
00:28:19
The book tells a fictional story that mirrors her own children's loss. Dina Manzanares is a co-host of the KTVX program.
00:28:28
It's about a little boy who has lost his dad, and as he's going through his life, going to school, going on different adventures, he's wondering if his dad is still there.
00:28:38
And they're trying to keep that memory a part of his life every day. In the book, the dad is still there, but he appears as an angel who's watching over his son.
00:28:50
Yeah, he's the guardian angel. One passage reads, I will forever love you, my sweet baby, until we see each other again.
00:28:59
Yes, I am with you. Did Corey Richen's story seem like something that could help other people?
00:29:05
I think what was appealing is that she was a grieving mother who was in her 30s raising three small kids.
00:29:14
Here she is trying to cope. She's trying to spread a message to others to help them cope as well.
00:29:19
That sounds like a conversation that we would like to hear more about. My kids and I kind of wrote this book on the different emotions and grieving processes that we've experienced last year.
00:29:31
And, you know, hoping that it can kind of help other kids. Myself and the co-hosts on the show are all moms with children.
00:29:39
We all have empathy for other mothers. You know, I just watched the struggle that my kids were going through.
00:29:47
Inside is an illustration of the whole family, including their dog. And there is something special for Eric,
00:29:54
dedicated to my amazing husband and a wonderful father You are an amazing woman and mom and we thank you for being vulnerable and sharing this and touching the lives of others
00:30:05
Thank you. I really appreciate being here. Corey goes on the program, Good Things Utah.
00:30:10
Did you see her appearance? I did. I thought she did pretty good. I'm nervous, but if it helps one kid, it was well worth it.
00:30:20
The co-host also sensed Corey's nerves and something else. What I did notice was just reading body language.
00:30:28
She was a little bit protected. She had her big heavy coat on and I thought, oh, she'll take it off before we do the interview.
00:30:37
But she never did. Did you chalk that up to, you know, the fact that she's been through this tragedy?
00:30:42
I did. That all changed when Dina arrived at work the next day. Get on my computer, checking my emails, and there is an anonymous message that's come into the entire station.
00:30:53
To every single person at the station? Yes. The subject line was, are you with me?
00:31:00
I open it up and all it says in capital letters and many exclamation points is, you know she killed her husband.
00:31:07
I mean, this is creepy. It was definitely creepy. It was definitely weird, but we didn't really give it another thought after the initial whoa.
00:31:18
You don't think maybe she did kill her husband? No, because wild emails can come in.
00:31:24
And we thought it was bizarre. We clocked it as being completely bizarre. Still, the email gave Dina pause.
00:31:32
Then she remembered something Corey shared in the green room at the TV station about Eric's death.
00:31:37
She said my husband passed away from COVID and he had a lung issue. I didn't pry when she said that.
00:31:46
And I thought, oh, COVID. Oh, well, maybe he did have something underlying. A week after that first email, Dina got another message.
00:31:55
That's when I started to go, okay, hold on, what is going on? I checked my Facebook inbox, and it's somebody that I don't know,
00:32:03
and it said, you need to investigate your children's book. Author, did you know that she is a suspect in the murder of her husband?
00:32:09
The plot thickens. Yes, and this is the point where I felt like I knew something was up.
00:32:15
Something was up. Investigators had been looking into Corey's past, and her story of a perfect life with her husband was about to unravel.
00:32:25
It's a house of cards. It is a delicate house of cards that she has constructed,
00:32:30
and it's beginning to fall apart. beyond writing a children's book Corey had also filed two lawsuits
00:32:50
months earlier her target was Eric's sister Katie who controlled Eric's trust and with it her brother's estate
00:32:58
you know nothing belongs to Corey at this point so I think you know she was obviously pretty upset with that.
00:33:04
While Eric's estate attorney says she assured Corey she could stay in the house,
00:33:08
Corey wanted to undo the trust and get at least half of her husband's assets. Still, her brother maintained she was only interested in one thing.
00:33:17
Everybody looked at it as she was trying to get money out of the estate or whatever.
00:33:20
She never cared about the money. She was trying to keep her house. In response to Corey's lawsuits, Eric's sister hired private investigator Todd Gabler.
00:33:29
My job was to investigate on behalf of the estate to determine whether there was a wrongful death, to determine if there was financial mismanagement.
00:33:40
Eric's sisters and father wanted to know if Corey squandered his money on her house flipping business or was even responsible for Eric's death.
00:33:49
When do you all realize that the Richens family has hired a private detective to look into all of this?
00:33:54
We knew he was reaching out to people. He reached out to my older sister, too, and then I reached out to him.
00:34:01
We didn't have a pleasant conversation, we'll say, but I just basically told him stay away from my family.
00:34:06
The PI brought on a forensic accountant who found Corey was deep in the red. She'd taken on too many houses.
00:34:14
None of it was solvent. Robbing Peter to pay Paul? That's exactly right. Having no money to fund your next project, you take the funding from your previous project and apply it to that.
00:34:24
It's a house of cards. It is a delicate house of cards that she has constructed, and it's beginning to fall apart.
00:34:32
Corey was in a huge amount of financial trouble. She was borrowing money from lenders that charged extremely high interest rates to pay off other lenders that were charging high interest rates.
00:34:47
And there was something else. A year and a half before he died, Eric's family says he learned Corey had secretly borrowed against their own home to start her business.
00:34:56
Corey has taken out this home equity line of credit, $250,000, without telling him.
00:35:03
And she apparently forged his signature on this. It was after Eric discovered that loan that he set up the trust giving control to his sister.
00:35:12
The family says that he did that because he didn't trust Corey. I think that's evident. There is a lot of evidence that suggests that the trust between these two was broken and that Eric took steps to protect his boys from her, from her financial mismanagement.
00:35:35
To anyone who wonders why Eric didn't just leave, did you learn anything during your investigation about why he chose to stay?
00:35:43
I think that he was concerned for the welfare of his three sons. As for the home she did sell some buyers accused Corey of lying about their condition And then back here the lipstick on a pig kind of classic scenario is what we we stepped into here We knew Molly Crosswhite bought one of Corey homes in Midway Utah
00:36:06
Her plan was to rent it out, but she left it not in great shape, even though it looked good, looked good, looked good,
00:36:12
but was not a place that we were going to be proud or comfortable putting tenants in.
00:36:18
Molly wanted the house and set up an inspection. We learned there was no insulation, there was electrical issues.
00:36:25
Disappointed, she wanted some of her money back. We had to negotiate while under contract a credit that we would get at closing
00:36:32
and let them know, hey, we can't rent it out the way that it is. Still, she says the credit didn't begin to cover the home's problems.
00:36:40
Looks good, feels bad kind of a deal. Right. Taryn and Alec Wright bought a house from Corey that they also say looked good.
00:36:48
I remember, you know, walking into the front door and we I'm getting goosebumps right now looking up.
00:36:55
I was like, we immediately agreed. We're like, wow. Weeks after moving in, they say their family's health started to seriously decline.
00:37:04
Then they found something troubling in their son's bedroom. When I moved the dresser away from the wall, the mold was growing behind the dresser.
00:37:12
And so we never noticed it before. Yeah. And that's when we've noticed it growing out of the walls.
00:37:17
Oh my gosh. Yes. After testing revealed dangerous mold levels throughout the house, the family immediately moved out.
00:37:26
They say their health issues improved. I do. Val Maynard sold the house to Corey and said he disclosed to her it had serious issues.
00:37:35
I showed him the really bad bathroom we hadn't used for about a year or so downstairs.
00:37:41
What was wrong with the bathroom? I had lots of water damage. The rights have now sued Corey,
00:37:47
alleging, among other things, that in the sales contract, she checked no on each question
00:37:52
related to previous water damage. Corey has denied the allegations in the lawsuit.
00:38:00
For Corey, the walls would soon start to feel like they were closing in. That's because investigators were about to find
00:38:06
a surprising trail of texts. There were dozens of texts on some days going back and forth.
00:38:13
That's a lot for a housekeeper. A lot for someone who's cleaning your house. And more scandalous accusations were coming.
00:38:22
You discover Corey Richens has a lover, a secret lover. I do. Corey wanted to live her life without Eric Richens.
00:38:43
For over a year, the tragic death of Eric Richens continued to weigh heavily on his family.
00:38:49
They were searching for answers and for someone to be held accountable. This was a family that would stop at nothing to get justice for Eric.
00:38:59
They would stop at nothing. They wanted justice for their brother and son. They believed they knew who that someone was, even in those early hours after Eric's death.
00:39:10
Eric Richen's sister approached one of the investigators in the driveway and said,
00:39:14
I think Corey had something to do with it. Really? They assumed that she was involved in his death, so they had to build their case.
00:39:20
When you have a family member pointing at a spouse right away, that is a big red flag.
00:39:28
A big red flag. Another red flag? That huge property. The so-called Midway Mansion.
00:39:35
This 20,000 square foot mansion that sits on 10 acres at the base of the Wasatch Mountains
00:39:40
was one of the properties Corey wanted to flip, but that would cost millions of dollars
00:39:44
and was apparently a big source of contention between Corey and Eric. Remember, Corey said they were celebrating
00:39:51
the Midway Mansion deal the night before Eric died with those Moscow mules and lemon drop shots.
00:39:57
The family told investigators Eric was reluctant to buy that home. Pat Revy is a reporter with KSL.com.
00:40:04
Corey was really hot on getting that property and flipping it, But Eric, not so much. He thought, no, this is just not going to be a wise investment.
00:40:14
Eric's sister was stunned when she learned Corey was going to close the deal just hours after his death.
00:40:20
The family was also troubled by Corey's initial story, that Eric died of a lung fungus, just like the one that killed his mother.
00:40:28
She told even Eric's dad that they found this same fungus in Eric's lungs, which was a complete lie.
00:40:38
Even Eric had been suspicious of Corey. He told his family about that Valentine's Day sandwich that made him sick just two weeks before his death.
00:40:47
I spoke with a number of people who he had contacted regarding his health condition that day.
00:40:55
And they were all very alarmed at how he sounded and what he was saying to them.
00:41:01
What was he saying? He was saying that Corey was trying to poison him. Eric had also told his family about an unusual drink he had with Corey on vacation years earlier.
00:41:11
They took a trip to Greece and that after Eric became violently sick. Now, we don't know why, but he leapt to the conclusion that Corey was trying to poison him.
00:41:23
And then he starts saying these statements to family members that if something were to happen to me, look at Corey.
00:41:31
The family says that's why Eric secretly removed Corey's control over his estate.
00:41:37
He wanted to protect his sons from a wife he no longer trusted. He's 39 and creating this living trust and making big changes.
00:41:46
It gives us reason to believe that he was in fear for his life. So my husband passed away unexpectedly last year And as she sat under the TV lights on Good Things Utah Corey may have believed the heat of the investigation was fading She was wrong A year after Eric death a new detective was assigned to the case
00:42:08
We're seeing the shift from law enforcement looking more at Corey as a suspect. One reason, investigators eventually ruled out the possibility that Eric had accidentally overdosed.
00:42:22
Did you find any evidence that showed that Eric Richens had a secret drug problem?
00:42:27
There's no evidence to suggest that at all. As they were looking for a connection between Corey and the drugs that killed Eric,
00:42:34
investigators found something curious on her phone. They look at the frequency of communication, who she's communicating with the most,
00:42:42
who she's calling the most. They also notice a frequency of communication with Carmen, who is her housekeeper.
00:42:52
These two are, it seems, talking about or discussing more than just cleaning houses.
00:42:57
Yeah, absolutely. Detectives found evidence of 800 text messages between Corey and Carmen prior to Eric's death.
00:43:06
Most of the texts had been deleted. So when law enforcement looks into Carmen Lauber, they come to find out that she's got significant drug history
00:43:14
and that she's actively in drug court working off her previous charges. I think this would be a big moment for law enforcement.
00:43:24
So they start putting two and two together, that maybe Carmen's the one supplying the fentanyl?
00:43:29
Yeah, and I don't think it's a huge leap. You've got deleted text messages. You've got an abnormal frequency in communication between Corey and her housekeeper.
00:43:40
And then you've got the drug history. They need to talk to Carmen immediately. Detectives were able to get a search warrant for Carmen's house.
00:43:48
They find a firearm during that search. I can tell you from experience, when a convicted felon is in possession of a firearm, those are real consequences.
00:43:59
And they found something else up on a wall amongst inspirational quotes and family photos.
00:44:06
Lo and behold, on the mirror is Eric Richens' obituary. This is telling. Carmen is close to Eric and the boys, and she is conspicuously absent from his funeral.
00:44:22
Her absence is noticed by the family, and I consider that early on as possible evidence of consciousness of guilt.
00:44:31
It was becoming clear to investigators that Carmen was connected to Eric's death.
00:44:36
It's just not me. They arrested Carmen on that gun violation and sat her down in an interrogation room.
00:44:42
that the details about everything we've been talking about are going to be important.
00:44:46
Right. For homicide investigation. Oh, that's not good. When they asked her if she had sold drugs to Corey, her memory was fuzzy.
00:44:54
So I wanted to, it's so confusing, but okay. So I want to say when she asked, but like I said,
00:45:03
Oh, I can't remember when you said. So they offered Carmen an incentive to help jog her memory.
00:45:10
We believe you, and that's why we're here working on what your get-out-of-jail-free car looks like.
00:45:15
Soon enough, Carmen's memory seemed to get better, and she would have quite the story to tell.
00:45:20
We need hard details. There's no more... I'm going to do whatever, because I've struggled so hard to get with my mat.
00:45:27
That's great motivation. Detectives were speaking with housekeeper Carmen Lauber,
00:45:45
who they believed was the key link between Corey and the fentanyl that killed her husband Eric.
00:45:51
Give up the details that will ensure Corey gets convicted of murder. Oh my God. We need hard details.
00:46:00
There's no more scram now. I'm going to do whatever because I've struggled so hard to get me like that.
00:46:05
That's great motivation. Like I said, I love Eric. He was a damn digger. And so Carmen began.
00:46:12
It was February 2022, a month before Eric died. Carmen said Corey reached out and asked if she could get drugs for a real estate investor.
00:46:21
Corey figured that Carmen might have access to someone who could provide her with drugs.
00:46:27
And Carmen did. A few days before Eric ate that Valentine's Day sandwich, Corey directed Carmen to a house she had flipped.
00:46:35
Carmen told investigators she went inside, took the cash Corey had left, and went to buy the drugs.
00:46:41
Carmen said she later returned and placed them in the backyard fire pit for Corey.
00:46:45
I pulled into the driveway to slap and there was just a seat. It wasn't a big fire pit.
00:46:49
It was a tiny fire pit. It's kind of the infamous fire pit of Midway. And it's right here.
00:46:55
And this is where apparently drugs were left. I'm not quite sure. Detectives paid a visit to the owner of the house.
00:47:03
You've already met her, Molly Crosswhite. How did you feel when you started to learn these details?
00:47:08
that this house that you bought might have been used to secure really a murder weapon of sorts, drugs.
00:47:17
It was upsetting. It just was kind of just shocking. I don't know how else to say it, but the last thing I expected.
00:47:25
In the interview room, the detectives were turning up the heat on Carmen. She told them that just days before Eric died, Corey reached out again looking for more drugs.
00:47:34
So there was a couple of... There was one. Okay, now we're eating something. I know one thing that when we got one, it wasn't dark enough.
00:47:46
I don't even know how fit it on the wheel. Dark enough, as in strong enough. Carmen said Corey wanted the Michael Jackson stuff.
00:47:55
All she knows about the Michael Jackson drug is that it killed him. But that... That message indicates a state of mind that she wants the drugs that are lethal.
00:48:07
Doesn't matter what it is. Detectives tracked down Carmen's drug dealer, a man named Robert Crozier.
00:48:14
It wasn't that hard to find him. He was in jail. How are you? Confused. I imagine you are.
00:48:22
So we're here to talk to you about a transaction that you made a little over a year ago with a female named Carmen Lauper.
00:48:32
You met her at a Maverick and Draper on two separate occasions in February of last year, so a little over a year ago.
00:48:39
Okay. She's been a couple of men. Didn't she ask for a blue specifically or fentanyl specifically?
00:48:44
I think she might have asked me for a blue like manicure. She knew it was your bud.
00:48:49
Okay, so she knew that there was a red pill in those pills. Absolutely. With the dealer corroborating Carmen's story,
00:48:57
detectives now believe they had what they'd been searching for, the crucial link between Corey Richens and the fentanyl that killed her husband.
00:49:05
It was a Monday morning, a month after that TV appearance. Law enforcement waited until Corey's boys were at school,
00:49:12
and then they arrested her. Corey Richens is here in the Summit County Jail tonight.
00:49:18
We're told she is being held without bail. I just kept on thinking she couldn't do that.
00:49:26
She wouldn't do that. Yeah, it's a lot to process, especially in a small valley like this.
00:49:33
It's pretty heavy stuff. Suddenly, the story of the grieving mother turned alleged killer who wrote a book to help her sons was everywhere.
00:49:42
A headline making case out of Utah. Oh, indeed. Part time author turned alleged killer.
00:49:49
If you haven't heard by now, this is Corey Richens. And the reason we're talking about this today is they have now formally charged her.
00:49:54
If she did it, if she planned this, how in the world can you come on live TV, put yourself in the spotlight, want publicity for your product,
00:50:05
and tell us that the most important thing to you is to keep his memory alive each and every day?
00:50:13
Corey called her friend Greg. Do you remember the first thing she said to you during your first phone call after her arrest?
00:50:21
Um, yeah. She was crying and she said she was scared. And what did you say to her?
00:50:26
Things will be all right. Things will be okay. We're going to help you. Five weeks after her arrest, Corey got her chance to ask for bail.
00:50:35
Miserosians, good morning. Attorney Sky Lazaro defended her. There's nothing to show that Corey did anything to Eric.
00:50:46
Being bad with money does not make you a murderer. Toward the end of the hearing, Eric's sister Amy addressed the court.
00:50:53
If she gets out on bail, I will be afraid not only for my own life and those of all of my family,
00:50:58
but most importantly for the lives of Eric's three sons. Our family has already suffered enough.
00:51:05
Please do not let Corey out on bail where she will be a risk to do further harm.
00:51:09
Defending Corey Darden Richens shall continue to be tamed without bail. Corey later entered a plea of not guilty and braced herself for the battle she was about to fight.
00:51:20
You took a innocent mom away from her babies, and this means war. For nearly three years, Corey Richens called the Summit County Jail home.
00:51:45
You keep calling and visiting and messages. You know, this is daily. Off and on, all day, continually.
00:51:53
You're her lifeline. 100%. 100%. We, of course, wanted to talk to Corey, too. In May of 2024, she sent us a recorded message.
00:52:04
I've been silent for a year. Worked away from my kids, my family, my life. living with the media, telling the world who they think I am, what they think I've done.
00:52:14
And the signs start speaking up. I'm anxious to get to trial, and I'm ready to get this one heck
00:52:20
of a fight. You took an innocent mom away from her babies, and this means war. In February 2026,
00:52:29
almost four years after her husband Eric's death, Corrie at last got her chance to fight the charges
00:52:34
against her, first-degree murder and attempted murder, along with fraud and forgery.
00:52:40
She sat at the defense table, flanked by her new team of attorneys. Eric's supporters lined one row of the packed courtroom, Corey's another.
00:52:48
My name is Brad Bloodworth. I am one of Summit County's criminal prosecutors. The evidence will prove that Corey Richens murdered Eric Richens.
00:52:59
The prosecution rolled back the timeline to Valentine's Day 2022, two weeks before Eric's death.
00:53:06
Good morning, sir. Hello. Turns out that sandwich Eric ate that made him sick came from his friend Gabe Morin's diner.
00:53:14
The jury got a look at the to-go order that Corey called in. So at 8.55, you know, it says a Greek omelet, quinoa salad, bagel sandwich with hash browns, and then Corey is typed in.
00:53:26
Does the detective tell you why this is coming into play? Sure does. Nope. Nope.
00:53:34
The prosecution argued Corey was the one who picked up the food so she could put something in Eric's sandwich.
00:53:40
Her first failed attempt to murder her husband. We know that Corey ordered it. Corey picked it up in person.
00:53:49
Eric was a really good friend of mine. Eric business partner Cody Wright told the jury Eric called him at 2 p that Valentine Day Why is it you remember that phone call The fear in his voice the urgency of the situation
00:54:11
The state theorized that Corey learned from her mistake after that failed attempt with the sandwich.
00:54:16
You bite into that and you taste the sourness of that fentanyl pill. you do not get the full dosage of what has been put on that sandwich
00:54:26
because you take a couple of bites and you put it down. Prosecutors argued her next try was something easier to ingest.
00:54:33
The Moscow meal she made that night was ginger beer and fentanyl. The lemon shot, drop shot, maybe lemon and fentanyl.
00:54:47
If it's in a shot glass masked by alcohol, You throw that back and the wrong taste doesn't matter because it's too late.
00:54:57
It's already in your system. The prosecutor told the jury to listen carefully to Corey's behavior on her 911 call.
00:55:04
The 911 call operator asks her to perform CPR. Corey told first responders she'd started CPR.
00:55:12
But the prosecution said there was more to the story. She seemed to do everything she could to avoid CPR as precious minutes ticked by.
00:55:19
Are you able to lay him on the floor on the ground? You can do it. You can do it.
00:55:32
This sheriff's deputy was one of the first to the Richens' house. He said Corey didn't act like most grieving family members right after a death.
00:55:40
Normally, they have tears. They look at me when I ask them a question while they respond.
00:55:48
It just, every time I spoke to Ms. Richens, it just seems like her face was in her hands, and I couldn't see her face.
00:55:57
It was just a little abnormal. Your Honor, the state calls Katie Richens Benson.
00:56:04
Eric's sister Katie also testified about Corey's behavior that morning. She wasn't crying like I was. She wasn't hysterical.
00:56:11
Katie said not long after Corey told her boys their father was dead, She was talking about closing the deal on the Midway Mansion.
00:56:19
I was dumbfounded. And I looked at Corey and said, you can't tell me you're going to close on that Midway Mansion when my brother just died.
00:56:31
And she looked at me, matter of fact, and said, yeah, absolutely. He has nothing to do with it.
00:56:37
The money's already gone through. It's all my business. I'm going to. Behavior was one thing.
00:56:44
But to make the case stick, prosecutors knew they needed to connect the dots between Corey and the drugs that killed Eric.
00:56:51
For that, they needed their star witness. The honor of the state calls Carmen Lauper.
00:56:57
On the stand, she admitted to a troubled past. Do you have a criminal history involving drugs?
00:57:05
Yes. Carmen testified about Corey asking her if she knew someone who could get pain medication for one of her investors.
00:57:11
I had texted Cori back and told her that I had a friend that could get them, but they were fat, not pills.
00:57:21
How did Cori Richards respond? She said, OK, go ahead and get. The state called this digital forensics expert to prove that Carmen met up with drug dealer Robert Crozier just days before the Valentine's incident and the week before Eric died.
00:57:36
They're located in at or near the exact same location. Prosecutors argued it was proof Carmen was telling the truth.
00:57:45
So all of that information corroborates the story that Carmen is telling. Which was helpful, because when he took the stand,
00:57:56
Robert Crozier couldn't remember how many times he'd met up with her. It was four years ago, so I don't really remember
00:58:04
if I met her more than once. The prosecution presented even more digital evidence to the jury.
00:58:11
The searches Corrie made on her cell phone. Those searches were incriminating, the prosecutor told the jury.
00:58:18
These are the searches. What was Corrie Richens worried about? How to completely wipe an iPhone, clean remotely,
00:58:27
can cops uncover deleted messages, luxury prisons for the rich in America, signs of being under FBI investigation, what is a legal dose of fentanyl, your thoughts on those
00:58:38
searches. It is incredibly important information about her state of mind at the time that those
00:58:44
searches were made. But why had Corey allegedly killed Eric? This wife and mother of three had
00:58:51
kept her share of secrets, but perhaps none as explosive as him. Do you solemnly swear the
00:58:58
testimony you're about to give in the matter before the court to be the truth, the whole truth,
00:59:02
and nothing but the truth, subject to the pains and penalties of perjury. Is the state ready to proceed, Mr. Bloodwood? Prosecutors may not be legally required to provide
00:59:24
motive in a murder case. But they also know it's human nature to want to know the why.
00:59:30
Why would Corey Richens murder her husband, Eric? Reason number one, said prosecutor Brad
00:59:35
Bloodworth, money. More than anything, she wanted his money to perpetuate her facade
00:59:44
of privilege, affluence, and success. The prosecution called forensic accountant
00:59:53
Brooke Carrington to the stand. She was initially hired by Eric family after he died As of the date that Eric Richens died Corey Richens was in financial distress
01:00:06
On March the 5th, 2022, immediately after closing on the Midway Mansion, what was the amount of Corey Richens' liabilities?
01:00:18
Right around $8 million. As her company tanked, the state argued, Corey homed in on her husband's life insurance policies.
01:00:26
A month before he died, prosecutors said Corey took out a $100,000 policy without Eric's knowledge.
01:00:33
This handwriting expert testified Eric probably did not sign that policy himself.
01:00:38
There was no evidence that Eric authored this signature. Corey ended up with nearly $1.4 million in life insurance money from Eric's death.
01:00:50
Prosecutors also highlighted for the jury the prenuptial agreement Corey had signed.
01:00:55
Their prenuptial agreement meant that if she left him, she would also leave most of his money.
01:01:03
The state argued that she believed Eric was worth more to her dead than alive. I got hired originally as an admin.
01:01:09
Becky Lloyd worked for Eric's company. She recalled a conversation with Corey a few months before he died.
01:01:15
She talked about how she was feeling trapped and she said that in many ways it would be better if he were dead.
01:01:26
The prosecutor told the jury that book Corey supposedly wrote to help her children through their grief was in reality also a money grab.
01:01:35
You see the emails, they're in evidence. She thought she would sell 100,000 copies in 10 months at $5 profit a copy.
01:01:44
That is not tethered to reality, but it does provide insight in how desperate she was for money.
01:01:52
According to the prosecution, there was more than money to Corey's motive. She had been cheating on Eric and was planning a fresh start with another man.
01:02:01
There was some question behind the scenes of the courthouse if they were even going to find him for him to testify.
01:02:08
And then her former boyfriend, Josh Grossman, entered the packed courtroom. Josh Grossman comes in, but it starts off rocky immediately.
01:02:19
With Corey seated just feet away, the clerk began swearing him in. Do you solemnly swear the testimony you're about to give in the matter before the court to be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth subject to the pains and penalties of perjury?
01:02:33
He asks, what do you mean by tell the whole truth? And the judge immediately stops everything, whisks the jury out of the courtroom and sits Mr. Grossman down and tries to spell out for him what he is signing up for.
01:02:51
Mr. Grossman, do you understand the difference between what's true and what's not true?
01:02:55
I do. Do you promise under the pains and penalties of perjury to tell the truth when you're asked questions?
01:03:01
Absolutely. And Josh agrees to do that finally, so the jury's brought back in. Josh's discomfort was palpable.
01:03:09
He testified that he started working for Corey's house flipping business in the Park City area in 2020.
01:03:15
He told the jury he'd stay in the houses they were working on. I had my dog with me. We do live in flips, me and the dog.
01:03:23
Other than accommodations, did she pay you for your service? I mean, we didn't have any contractual agreement.
01:03:34
She took care of me. I lived for free. She gave me money whenever I needed it. I just, you know, I liked her.
01:03:46
So I'd work for free. Not that she didn't pay me. She did from time to time. in lump sums.
01:03:58
During that time that you were romantically involved with Miss Richens, did you love her?
01:04:05
Yes. During that time, did you feel that she loved you? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have a tendency of going head over heels, though,
01:04:22
probably more than most. So, you know, I think she did. The prosecutor pointed out that a few months before Eric died, Corey had even booked a trip with Josh to the island of St. Martin.
01:04:36
I think that was a birthday present. Josh's discomfort only grew as the state showed the jury dozens of text messages between him and Corey.
01:04:44
He was having a very difficult time, breathing deeply, making noises, spinning in his chair.
01:04:50
Corey was texting with Josh and drove an hour to visit him on Valentine's Day 2022,
01:04:57
the day prosecutors alleged she tried to poison Eric with that sandwich. The following day, Josh texted Corey that he was in love with her.
01:05:05
She responded, like actually in love with me? If I was divorced right now and ask you to marry me tomorrow, you would?
01:05:13
Josh replied, yes, in love with Y-O-U. Of course I would. He then puts his head down on the witness stand like he doesn't want to be there.
01:05:23
He then starts to cry and wipes tears from his eyes. Mr. Grossman, that'll do with me. Do you need a minute or two?
01:05:30
I don't know what I mean. Let's just start with that. Why don't we take a five... Pause for a moment, if you don't mind.
01:05:38
Testimony soon resumed. And the subject again? Those texts. One week before Eric died, Corey wrote Josh,
01:05:45
I have a crazy dream. I divorce and come up with millions and millions. We buy Midway and live in the guest house raise some kids have a little farm Deal Corey and Josh even made plans to celebrate her purchase of the Midway mansion on March 4th 2022 When he didn hear from her that day he texted what going on with you You good
01:06:06
Corey responded, no, Eric passed away. Josh said the next time he saw Corey was two weeks later.
01:06:13
That's when she asked the Iraq war veteran about his time in the military. She asked if I had ever killed anybody.
01:06:20
Sir, what was that follow up question? She asked me how it made me feel or something along those lines.
01:06:29
And then I answered her. I took it as not out of the normal, though, really. The prosecution made the point that Corey was trying to deal with her guilt of killing her husband
01:06:45
by trying to figure out how her boyfriend dealt with it. Josh said his relationship with Corey cooled off in the months following Eric's death.
01:06:53
Things weren't the same, so I don't know if that led to us parting ways or what,
01:07:00
but there was a lot on both of us, you know what I mean? I understand. Thank you, sir. I don't have any further questions.
01:07:09
After calling dozens of witnesses, Okay, Your Honor, then the state rests. It was the defense's turn, with a move no one was expecting.
01:07:20
I saw a lot of mouths dropped and eyebrows shot up and they stared at that defense table.
01:07:39
Prosecutors had given jurors in Park City, Utah, a lot to work with. Do you solemnly swear the testimony you're about to give me?
01:07:45
They'd put on 43 witnesses to make their case. I'm one of Ms. Richen's attorneys, so it's nice to meet you.
01:07:52
The defense cross-examined 38 of them, hoping to unravel it. Going back to the web searches.
01:07:59
Corey's attorney, Alex Ramos, wanted the jury to understand that those questionable searches Corey made on her phone happened after Eric died.
01:08:07
I imagine you're aware that all these searches were done after Ms. Richen knew she was under investigation, correct?
01:08:13
Yes. Corey's former lawyer, Sky Lazaro. The timing of these searches, I think, are probably the most critical and important part of the analysis of them.
01:08:25
These searches were done after she was served the search warrant for her home and for her electronics.
01:08:32
She just found out her husband died of a lethal overdose of fentanyl. You might want to know what that means.
01:08:37
Those searches, to me, were less of an issue than some other things in this case.
01:08:42
How does the defense combat a lover? You know, Josh's mere existence in this. Sometimes the best way to combat things that are bad for your client or optically bad for your client is just to hit him head on from the beginning.
01:08:57
There was no running away from Josh. The prosecution hammered the point that Corey wanted a new life.
01:09:04
The defense argued it was an affair, nothing more. Would it be fair to say that the talk about a future together between you and Corey was really more a fantasy than a realistic expectation?
01:09:18
My opinion? You want my opinion on it? Sure. I'd say yeah. Yeah. more of something that maybe I thought I wanted,
01:09:33
but didn't necessarily, like, I couldn't picture it in the future, you know. To counter witnesses who said Eric was scared about how sick he got
01:09:44
after eating that Valentine's Day sandwich, Corey's old friend, Allie Staking, testified Eric thought the whole thing was funny.
01:09:51
Was everyone laughing? Yes, we were all laughing, and we jokingly said, don't eat what Corey feeds here.
01:09:56
When it came to the accusation that Eric's death would bring Corey an infusion of cash,
01:10:01
the defense pointed out Eric made a lot of money and would continue making plenty more.
01:10:07
He declared to the IRS that he made over $750,000. That was just in one year. I mean, if you accept that theory that she doesn't like him or she doesn't want to be married to him,
01:10:18
you know, she's better off with him if it's purely financial motivated. The money.
01:10:26
The boyfriend, the sandwich, the Google searches were all problems for Corey. Good afternoon, Ms. Lovlin.
01:10:33
Good afternoon. But it was the cross-examination of Carmen the housekeeper that could make or break the defense's case.
01:10:40
Reasonable doubt is one of the things that you don't always get in cases. But this case does have certain amounts of reasonable doubt.
01:10:49
And that is, you know, the stuff with Carmen. There was Carmen's fuzzy memory when police first talked to her.
01:10:55
You told them more than once over those days. You had a lot of memory problems, correct?
01:11:00
That my memory wasn't the best, yes. To underscore her credibility issues, the defense got Carmen to admit she had a history of lying in drug court to stay out of prison.
01:11:09
That's what addicts do when you're using. That's true. Addicts lie. And the defense said with Carmen it was always about staying out of prison.
01:11:17
You are willing to do whatever it takes to save yourself from getting kicked out of drug court and going to prison, correct?
01:11:24
I'm going to go forward with the truth, yes. And you tell them, I'll do whatever it takes.
01:11:31
Yes. The prosecution had given Carmen immunity in exchange for her testimony. And the bottom line, said the defense, was Corey never actually used the word fentanyl when talking to Carmen.
01:11:43
You told authorities during the course of these interviews that Corey Richardson's never asked for fentanyl.
01:11:50
yes Robert Crozier who also received immunity for his testimony said on the stand
01:11:59
he did fentanyl to sell at the time Eric died. You had no access to it in January, February, March of 2022.
01:12:07
No. Do you solemnly swear this? With the lead detective, the defense drove home the point that
01:12:13
law enforcement never found any fentanyl in the Richens house. During that four years period of
01:12:19
time, as recently as less than a month ago, you were still issuing search warrants. Is that right?
01:12:24
yes and there were a total of at least 10 or 10 searches by law enforcement of ms richard's home
01:12:34
is that right there were 10 search warrants issued yeah we have no murder weapon like you haven't
01:12:40
found anything that was connected to eric's death no fentanyl in the house correct
01:12:46
there was a boatload of fentanyl in his stomach that came out of the house with him if the lead
01:12:52
detective couldn't point to any fentanyl in the house. The defense argued maybe Eric kept a secret
01:12:56
stash in this old pill bottle. What else do we find on that first day that Eric died? What else
01:13:02
do they find? The hydrocodone bottle. Why wasn't it tested? What was kept in that bottle?
01:13:10
The painkiller was prescribed to Eric six years earlier. The defense asked the first detective on
01:13:16
the scene about it. Wasn't there an empty hydrocodone bottle seized from right next to
01:13:20
Mr. Richen's bed? There was. You didn't put it in an evidence bag? No. You didn't swab it for the
01:13:28
inside of it? No, it was empty. Do you know where it is to this day? No. When it was time for the
01:13:34
defense to put on its own witnesses, Corey's attorneys asked for a break. We're all seated
01:13:40
really on the edge of our seats in that courtroom, anticipating that the defense will call witnesses.
01:13:47
Then the jury heard this. Your Honor, after consulting with our client, the defense rushed.
01:13:55
I saw a lot of mouths dropped and eyebrows shot up and they stared at that defense table.
01:14:00
What did you make of the defense not calling any witnesses? When you're the defense in trial, everything is on the spot, kind of game day decision.
01:14:10
How's it going and what do we do next? And you have to calculate the risks. Not putting on witnesses, is that going to hurt Corey?
01:14:18
Are we leaving them on a high note? And have we been able to effectively cross-examine everyone in order to get the points we needed to make for her defense through the state's witnesses?
01:14:28
Minister Bloodworth would you like to proceed Yes Your Honor we may proceed To a packed gallery both sides made their closing arguments All the evidence in this case proves that Corey Richens murdered her husband
01:14:42
and the father of her three children, Eric Richens. Do not let them fool you. Do not fall for red herrings.
01:14:51
Corey Richens did not kill Eric Richens. Count one. And with that, the case went to the jury.
01:14:57
So I'm looking at Corey, and I said to the lady next to me, I'm like, I said, she's shaking, and she goes, she's trembling.
01:15:16
After sitting side by side for three weeks, the jurors tasked with deciding Corey Richen's guilt or innocence began their deliberations.
01:15:25
We spoke with two of them, Mark and Eric. Out of privacy concerns, they asked us not to use their last names.
01:15:32
Take us into that jury room. I mean, as soon as we got in the jury room, we just all needed to sit down and take collective breaths.
01:15:39
And then after that, we just started to say, hey, look, we each are going to talk for five minutes about what we saw.
01:15:45
Not necessarily, is Corey innocent or guilty, but just what did your lens as a person see on this trial?
01:15:53
Mark's front row seat in the jury box allowed him to keep close watch on the defense table.
01:15:58
Did you keep an eye on Corey Richens' expressions throughout the trial and how she was reacting to things?
01:16:05
I absolutely did. For the most part, I think there was a poker game that was being played.
01:16:13
The jurors were also glued to the testimony of key witness Carmen Lauber. Carmen, the housekeeper, tricky witness, because she has this past with drugs.
01:16:23
She's in trouble herself. And she's been given a bit of a lifeline here, you know, to help the prosecution.
01:16:30
I saw a woman who was making genuine efforts to get on the right path and improve her life.
01:16:36
And frankly, her testimony combined with the digital evidence of her travels really corroborated her testimony.
01:16:45
They felt for Corey's former boyfriend, Josh, too. You know, my heart bled for him.
01:16:51
He was having problems breathing. He needed water. I had such compassion for him, especially being a veteran.
01:16:57
As for the defense, do you think that was a mistake, to not put on a formal defense and, you know,
01:17:03
just try the case through cross I don think it was a mistake as much as it was their tactic and that was their right to do so Juror Eric thinks though the defense could have made more of the fact
01:17:14
that no one knows for sure how Eric Richens ingested that fentanyl. I think probably if they had focused on that,
01:17:22
then they may have gotten to reasonable doubt. In the plus column for the defense?
01:17:27
A closing argument that tugged on this juror's heartstrings. I was unexpectedly wittable and I was not much older than Corey and I had two wittables.
01:17:37
How do you judge someone in that moment? They want you to look at a woman in the worst moment of her life and to judge her grief.
01:17:50
There is no wrong way to grieve. It was a plea for not sending a mom to jail who has three children.
01:17:56
I understand that. I was rooting that, but then I got back to deliberations and it was like, wait a minute, Mark, like, take a deep breath.
01:18:05
Stop focusing on the emotional element. And every time I tried to give her a lifeline or an off-ramp off, it just ended and it just pointed right back to her.
01:18:14
After only three hours. The court was informed that the jury has reached a verdict.
01:18:20
The speed at which the jury came back was shocking to everyone. We all quietly file into the courtroom and the judge makes it very clear that there is to be no outward reaction.
01:18:33
If anybody in here can't follow these instructions, this is your chance to leave.
01:18:37
I'm looking at Corey and I said to the lady next to me, I'm like, I said, she's shaking and she goes, she's trembling.
01:18:43
And I looked down at her feet and they were shaking. Counsel, Ms. Richards, please stand.
01:18:48
Count one, aggravated murder. We, the jury, unanimously find that the defendant, Corey Richens, is guilty of aggravated murder.
01:19:06
Count two, attempted aggravated murder. We, the jury, unanimously find that the defendant, Corey Richens, is guilty of attempted aggravated murder.
01:19:18
Guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty. And you just see Corey just... Yeah. Her head goes down.
01:19:25
You can just read her face. Right. She did a pretty good job throughout the whole trial having that poker face on,
01:19:33
but at that moment she looked down and her world came crashing down inside her head A look of defeat Defeat I saw a broken woman but I think there carnage everywhere It was shock I mean it was literally just shock You know my mother said Corey did a good job that she just didn break down there
01:19:51
And I said, well, it's not a matter of breaking down. I said, it's just shock. You don't know what to do.
01:19:55
I said, and I felt the same thing she did. For Eric's family, finally justice. Four years ago, our family lost the brightest light.
01:20:06
Eric is deeply loved and missed every single day. We are grateful to everyone who has worked tirelessly to bring justice for Eric.
01:20:14
Our focus is now on honoring Eric's life and supporting his boys as we all continue to heal.
01:20:20
Thank you all for being here. Two months after the verdict on what would have been Eric's 44th birthday,
01:20:27
Corey Richens was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
01:20:31
She also has another criminal case pending, with 26 additional financial charges.
01:20:38
She has not yet entered a plea. Her three boys are living with Eric's family. Back in the shadow of the Wasatch Mountains, the Midway Mansion, once a symbol of everything Corey dreamed of, now has new owners.
01:20:55
And renovations are well underway. At the Mirror Lake Diner, Gabe Morin thinks about Eric when someone orders his favorite, chicken fried steak, or sits in his usual seat.
01:21:10
You know, I'm sad this whole situation happened, but I think it's the right outcome.
01:21:16
He certainly never imagined the role his diner would play in Corey Richen's murder trial, or that his friend's three sons would be left without a father.
01:21:24
Eric was just a simple good guy you know and his kids don't have a dad you know and that's the part
01:21:32
that hits me hard and you know and those kids will be okay Eric taught them right
01:21:38
they are smart strong kids they'll be okay but it's not fair That's all for this edition of Dateline
01:21:50
and don't forget to check out our Talking Dateline podcast which will go behind the scenes of tonight's episode
01:21:57
available Wednesday in the Dateline feed wherever you get your podcasts. We'll see you again next Friday at 9, 8 central.
01:22:06
I'm Lester Holt. For all of us at NBC News, good night.