Lover of Utah children’s grief author Kouri Richins breaks down as couple’s secret texts exposed in court
Utah children’s grief author Kouri Richins’ handyman lover broke down sobbing in court Wednesday as their secret gushing texts were exposed during her murder trial.
Robert Josh Grossman, 43, testified about the slew of messages he exchanged with the mom-of-three just weeks before she allegedly poisoned her hubby with a fatal dose of fentanyl in 2022, KSL reported.
“If I was divorced right now and ask you to marry me tomorrow, you would?” Richins, 35, texted Grossman less than a month before her husband, Eric Richins, died.
Grossman, an Iraq war vet, responded: “Yes. In Love with Y O U! Of course I would.”
In another message just days later, Richins mused about a future with her lover — if only her husband would “go away,” the court heard.
Kouri Richins and her husband, Eric Richins, in a photo.Kouri Richins/Facebook
“If he could just go away and you could just be here! Life would be so perfect!!!” she allegedly texted Grossman.
Grossman broke down sobbing and wiped away tears as the slew of messages were shown to jurors on Wednesday.
Elsewhere during his testimony, Grossman detailed a chilling exchange he had with Richins just days after her husband died when she asked if he’d ever killed anyone.
“We sat there and talked for quite a while… I had never seen her that way, obviously, and it was a heavy conversation, and I’m not used to that with her. She’s not used to being open like that,” Grossman told jurors.
“She asked if I had ever killed anybody … She asked me how it made me feel or something along those lines. And then I answered her.”
After confirming that he had taken a life while serving in Iraq, Grossman said the author then asked “how it made me feel or something along those lines.”
Grossman told jurors he never suspected at that time that Richins was allegedly responsible for the death.
Richins is on trial for allegedly killing her husband by slipping four times the lethal dose of the synthetic opioid into a Moscow mule cocktail she prepared for him in March 2022.
Following his death, Richins then self-published a children’s book about grief to help her sons and other kids cope with the loss of a parent.
Prosecutors have argued Richins had been planning a future with her lover in the lead up to the killing and she wrongly believed she would inherit her husband’s estate worth more than $4 million.
“The evidence will prove that Kouri Richins murdered Eric for his money and to get a fresh start at life,” Summit County prosecutor Brad Bloodworth told jurors early on in her trial.
Richins’ defense team, however, have claimed Eric died of an accidental overdose.
The children’s author has pleaded not guilty.
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