"GRIEF BOOK KILLER ON TRIAL, JOHNNY GAUDREAU & THE DRUNK DRIVER WHO WANTS TO WALK FREE"

0:03 Caalaroga Shark Media. Good morning, I'm read Carter. Thursday, February twenty six, twenty twenty six, Park City, Utah, Ski Country, wealthy enclave, the kind of place where you flip two million dollar houses and drive a Mercedes and tell people life is good. Coori Ritchans, thirty five years old, is on trial for murdering her husband Eric. Prosecutors say she slipped five times the lethal dose of fentanyl into a Moscow mule and watched him die in his sleep. Then she wrote a children's book about it called it Are You with Me? Put Angel Wings on the Dad promoted it on local radio because apparently grief needs a platform.

0:48 Days one and two of testimony rapped. This week. We have opening statements, bodycam footage the in laws, and EMT who says Eric was cold to the touch and flatlined, and a defense claiming he was a secret painkiller addict who may have gotten his own fentanyl in Mexico. We'll break down every bit of it. Also this week, Sean Higgins, the drunk driver who killed NHL star Johnny Godro and his brother Matthew on their bicycles the night before their sister's wedding. He already rejected a plea deal of thirty five years. Now his lawyers want the entire case thrown out, claiming new testing shows his blood alcohol was actually below the legal limit. Meanwhile, on Sunday, Team USA won Olympic gold in Milan, and on that ice with medals around their necks, Johnny Gudro's children were there, his jersey was there, his family was there. And a quick update on Nancy Guthrie.

1:41 Savannah Guthrie's eighty four year old mother missing from her Arizona home for nearly four weeks. The reward just hit one million dollars. The family is running out of hope. I'm Red Carter today, a children's book killer on trial, a drunk driver trying to walk free, and a gold medal haunted by the dead. This is celebrity trials. Let me paint you the picture. March fourth, twenty twenty two. Hoytsville, Utah, a small community just outside Park City, one of the wealthiest ski towns in America. Coury and Eric Richans are celebrating.

2:22 Coory just closed on a two million dollar house she's been flipping. They're having a drink together before bed. She makes him a moscow mule. He drinks it. They go to sleep. Around three in the morning, Corey goes to comfort one of their sons who's having night terrors. When she comes back to the bedroom, Eric is on his back, cold, heavy, not breathing. She calls nine one one. When the EMT arrives, Eric is on the floor at the foot of the bed. His body is straight, not angled the way EMT Margaret offer it normally finds patience. His skin is cold to the touch. She flatlines him. There is more blolood coming from his mouth than she expected to find. Eric Richins, thirty four years old, father of three, real estate developer, dead on the floor of his own home. Cause of death fentanyl, specifically five times the lethal dose of fentanyl in his bloodstream. Prosecutors say Corey put it there. Summit County Prosecutor Brad Bludworth opened Monday with a simple thesis.

3:23 Curie Richins murdered her husband for money and a fresh start. She was four point five million dollars in debt. She wrongly believed Eric's estate was worth more than four million dollars. She had secretly taken out nearly two million dollars in life insurance policies on him without his knowledge. She was also having an affair Robert Josh Grossman. Bloodworth showed the jury text messages Cory texting Grossman about her dream leave Eric, get the millions in the divorce one day, marry her boyfriend instead. And then there's the search history, because Google never forgets luxury prisons for the rich America? Can cops force you to do a lie detector test? Not exactly the search history of a grieving widow. The prosecution's case has layers. This wasn't just one poisoning attempt. The month before Eric died Valentine's Day, Coury allegedly gave him a fentanyl laced sandwich. He broke out in hives and blacked out.

4:24 That's the attempted criminal homicide charge she tried. Once he survived, she waited three weeks and tried again. The key witness connecting Corey to the drug is the family's housekeeper, Carmen Laubert. She claims she sold fentanyl to Corey on multiple occasions. Lauber is not charged. She was granted immunity to testify. The defense immediately went after her credibility in opening statements arguing Lauber didn't give Richan's fentanyl, that she's motivated to lie for legal protection. Here's the complication. Lauber's dealer has said he was in jail and detoxing when he told detectives he sold her fentanyl. He later gave a sworn affidavit saying he sold her only oxy conton. No fentanyl was found anywhere in the Richins home. The prosecution's drug chain has a crack in it. Defense attorney Catherine Nestor opened Monday by playing the nine one one call Coory sobbing, barely able to answer questions. Those were the sounds of a wife becoming a widow, Nestor told the jury, and then Nestor laid out an alternative theory. Eric Richins had lime disease and was addicted to prescription painkillers. He asked Coury to procure opioids for him a few weeks before he died. He took a trip to Mexico, and the defense suggests he may have obtained fentanyl there himself. Photos shown to the jury an empty pill bottle sitting on Eric's bedside table the night of his death, bags of gummies he used regularly. But here's what the defense couldn't explain away. Coury's own bodycam footage from that night. Summit

5:57 County Sheriff's deputy Vincent and Guion, captured her on camera in pajamas, pacing, telling police her husband had no history of illicit drug use, zero none. My husband's active. He didn't just die in his sleep. This is insane. And Eric's sister, Katie Richins Benson, testified their mother was a drug and alcohol counselor had instilled in the family from childhood the dangers of drug use. Eric didn't have a secret fentanyl habit, his family says. So then there was what Corey's sister in law noticed when she arrived at the house that morning. Corey wasn't disheveled, wasn't undone by grief. Her hair was done up. She looked, in the words of testimony, well put together, not how most people look at three in the morning. After discovering their husband dead, Day two brought more forensic detail. Investigator Cameron Larsen from the Medical Examiner's Office found an empty bottle of Cock and Bull ginger beer in the trash. The ginger beer you us use to make a Moscow mule, exactly the drink Corey said she made for Eric that night. K nine officer David Pimentel searched the master bedroom and bathroom.

7:10 Found three prescription drugs Naltrek's own, a drug used to curb opioid cravings, and an antibiotic. He did not find the THHC gummies. Corey told police Eric might have taken a trained drug. Detecting K nine found nothing illicit in that room. An emt Offert testified to something subtle but damning. She normally finds patients on the side of their bed when they've had a cardiac event. Eric was at the foot of the bed, flat straight, unusual as if placed there rather than fallen. Here's the full picture prosecutors are building. Corey Richins was drowning in debt. Her husband's money was the life raft she secretly insured him for nearly two million dollars. She was planning to leave him for another man.

7:58 She tried to kill him on Valentine's Day, three weeks later she succeeded. Then, she wrote a children's book called Are You with Me? With an angel winged father watching over his son, and went on local TV to promote it. My prediction guilty. The financial motive is airtight. The search history is a gift to the prosecution. The bodycam footage catches her lying about Eric's drug history in real time. The housekeeper problem is real, but it's not fatal. Fentanyl in the system is fentanyl in the system, and it had to come from somewhere. The defense's best play is the housekeeper. If they can convince the jury that lawber is lying, that the drug supply chain is broken, that Eric may have obtained fentanyl himself without telling his wife.

8:43 That's reasonable doubt. It's a long shot, but it's not nothing. Trial runs through March twenty sixth. More witnesses to come, including the housekeeper herself. Keep watching. Eric Rischans was thirty four years old, father of three boys, realists, state developer. He made his wife a drink to celebrate her success. She killed him with it. He should be raising those boys, He should be building his next project. He should be alive. Rest in peace, Eric, We'll be right back. On Sunday. America won gold in men's ice hockey for the first time since nineteen eighty, but the celebration belonged to a player who wasn't there, and this week the man who killed Johnny Gudreau wants to walk free. Welcome back to celebrity Trials. I'm Red Carter. I want to start with Sunday because before we talk about the legal maneuver that's trying to let a killer walk, we need to talk about what happened on the ice in Milan February twenty second, twenty twenty six, the Milano Santa Julia Ice Hockey Arena Team USA VERSUS Canada Men's Olympic gold medal game, the first time NHL players have competed in the Olympics since twenty fourteen. For the entire tournament, one jersey had been hanging in the American locker room, Number thirteen Godro on

10:13 the back Johnny Gadro's jersey hung there before every game, teammates walking past it thinking about him, playing for him. Jack Hughes scored in overtime. Team USA won the gold two to one, and when they took their victory lap, Matthew Tikachuk held that number thirteen jersey above his head and skated around the ice. Players took turns carrying it. An empty jersey for a player who should have been there. Then Tikachuk asked if Johnny's children could come down from the stands. Dylan Larkin and Zach Warensky went up into the seating area. They brought down Johnny's daughter Noah and his son, Johnny Junior. The players held them posed with them for the team photo. Skated around the ice with them, a two year old boy and his sister standing where their father would have stood, wearing gold medals their father should have won. Here's what made it even more impossible to watch without falling apart. February twenty second is Johnny Junior's birthday, his second birthday, Meredith Godreau posted on Instagram.

11:17 Two twenty two is baby Johnny's birthday, special date picked by his daddy due to travel at the time. Happy second birthday to our baby Johnny Boy. Couldn't think of a better way to spend your second birthday than a fun day tomorrow. His father chose that date, and on his son's second birthday, the entire United States hockey team put that child in a team photo in front of the world. Meredith Godro told reporters, we wished we were a part of it, so when we got the call to come out. It felt like maybe Johnny did make the team. Team captain Austin Matthews said he was with us in spirit the whole tournament. He's touched everybody on that ice, in attendance in Milan, Johnny's parents, Guy and Jane, his widow Meredith, his children, the whole family watching the gold medal that belonged to all of them. Johnny Gaudrou should have been on that team. He was a near certain selection. Played international hockey since twenty thirteen, competed in four World Championships, Universally regarded as one of the best American players of his generation. Two hundred forty three career goals, five hundred assists seven hundred sixty three games in the NHL, known as Johnny Hockey from his Boston College days where he won the twenty fourteen Hoby Baker Award, nine seasons with the Calgary Flames, a seven year, sixty eight million dollar deal with the Columbus Blue Jackets. He should have been in Milan instead. He was a jersey on a hook.

12:46 Now the reason this case is back in the news this week and it's infuriating. August twenty ninth, twenty twenty four, Carney's Point, New Jersey. Johnny Godro thirty one years old and his brother Matthew twenty nine, are riding their bikes on a rural road near their childhood home the night before their sister Katy's wedding. They were supposed to be groomsmen the next morning. Shawn Higgins, forty three years old, a married father of two Iraq war veteran finance worker for an addiction treatment company, had been drinking since mid afternoon, by his own admission, five or six beers. He'd also been driving around for two hours, sometimes talking on his phone after an upsetting conversation with his mother. His wife had told prosecutors he'd been drinking regularly since working from home, had a history of, in her words, driving like a nut.

13:42 A driver in front of Higgins told police he had been driving aggressively when she and another car slowed down and moved left to go around the Goudro brothers on their bikes. Higgins sped up, veered right hit them both. He indicated he didn't even see them, said the judge at the initial hearing. Blood alcohol test at the time point zero eight seven above New Jersey's legal limit of point zero eight, failed the field sobriety test, charged with two counts of death by auto, aggravated manslaughter, vehicular homicide, reckless driving evidence, tampering, and leaving the scene of an accident. January twenty twenty five, Higgins rejected a plea offer of thirty five years in prison pleaded not guilty to the full indictment. His defense attorneys called him a good person who made a horrible decision. Then the defense tried to argue the Gaudro brother's own drinking contributed to their deaths.

14:35 A judge shut that down flat. The brothers were on bicycles on a road, they weren't operating vehicles. Whatever they drank is irrelevant. And now, this Tuesday, February twenty fourth, a virtual hearing in Salem County, Higgins's attorney, Richard Kleinberger the Third dropped a bombshell. New testing, he claims shows Higgins's blood alcohol level at the time of the crash was actually pointed zero seven to five below the legal limit. Therefore, Kleinberger argues the entire indictment should be called into question because the grand jury was given an incorrect BAC when they voted to charge him. Prosecutors said they wanted time to review the full motion before responding to the judges question about whether the case would be represented to the grand jury. Next hearing April fourteenth. Let me tell you what's happening here. This is a legal strategy, not an innocence claim. Even if you believe the point zero seven five number, and prosecutors don't, that doesn't mean Sean Higgins wasn't impaired. It doesn't mean he wasn't driving recklessly. He admitted to five or six beers. He had a history of road rage. He sped up when other drivers slowed down for cyclists. He failed a field sobriety test, he left the scene. Two people are dead. BAC is one element of the charge, but it's not the only one.

15:52 Death by auto and New Jersey doesn't require a BAC above point zero eight. It requires reckless driving. He was reckless. That much is not in dispute. This motion to dismiss is a hail mary, a technical argument designed to create procedural confusion, slow things down, maybe force a representation to the grand jury. The defense is doing its job, but the facts don't change. Johnny Goudreau and his brother Matthew are dead. Their children don't have a father, Their wives are widows. Their sister got married without her brothers there to walk her down the aisle. Both Meredith Gaudro and Madeline Gadro were pregnant when their husbands died. Johnny's third child, Carter, was born in April twenty twenty five. He has never met his father. Sean Higgins sat at his hearing this week and cried. Yes, he cried. His defense team called him empathetic, a loving father, a good person who made a horrible decision. Johnny Godro made no decision that night.

16:54 He was on a bike on a road with his brother, doing nothing wrong, and somewhere in the stands in Malone. His children wore gold medals and smiled for a team photo. Johnny Godro was thirty one years old, Matthew Godre was twenty nine. Loving brothers, devoted husbands. Fathers should be at their sister's first anniversary dinner this year, should be seeing their children take their first steps. This case goes back to court April fourteenth. We'll be watching rest in peace, Johnny, Rest in Peace, Matthew. Brief update on a case we've been following. Nancy Guthrie eighty four years old, mother of Today's show host Savannah Guthrie. She lives outside Tucson, Arizona.

17:44 On January thirty first, she was kidnapped from her home. Nearly four weeks later, she has not been found. This Tuesday, Savannah Guthrie posted on Instagram her family is now offering a one million dollar reward for information leading to her mother's recovery, and in the same breath, Savannah acknowledged what the family is beginning to fear. She may already be gone. She may already have gone home to the Lord that she loves and is dancing in heaven. Nancy Guthrie needs daily medication to survive four weeks without it. What investigators have drops of her blood on the front porch, surveillance video of a masked man outside her front door the night she vanished, DNA from a glove found near the home, but no match is yet. Over twenty thousand tips have come in, several hundred people are actively working the investigation, FBI, Pima County Sheriff's Office, other agencies, and still nothing. Someone out there knows something that can bring her home. Savannah Guthrie said one million dollars. If you have any information about Nancy Guthrie's disappearance, contact the Pima County Sheriff's office.

18:57 Her family is begging. They are running out of time. Nancy Guthrie is eighty four years old, a mother, a grandmother. She should be home. Will keep you updated. That's celebrity trials for Thursday, February twenty sixth, twenty twenty six. Corey Richins murder trial underway in Park City, Utah. Two days of testimony down. The housekeeper who says she sold the defendant fentanyl is still to come. The defense has a theory, but a long road. Trial runs through March twenty sixth. Sean Higgins trying to get the Gaudro case thrown out, claiming his blood alcohol was below the legal limit. Next hearing April fourteenth. Meanwhile, on Sunday in Milan, Johnny Gaudro's children stood on an Olympic gold medal ice with their father's teammates and Nancy Guthrie still missing. The reward is now one million dollars four weeks in counting. I'm reed, Carter tomorrow more from the Richins trial and whatever else breaks, This is so celebrity trials