Kouri Richins: After the Verdict, the Children

The jury took three hours. But the case that matters most now isn't in any courtroom.

Three boys were 9, 7, and 5 when their father died of a fentanyl overdose in their Utah home. Their mother wrote them a children's book about grief, went on television to promote it, and was arrested for his murder. A jury convicted her on all counts. According to the lead investigator's trial testimony, the book promotion is part of what put investigators back on the case. The story she said she built for her sons may be part of what put her in prison.

On Hidden Killers, we go where the verdict doesn't reach. We examine what betrayal trauma does to children — the specific psychological damage that occurs when the person who hurt you was supposed to protect you — and what the research tells us about kids who lose both parents at once. We look at Susan Wright's children, placed with their father's family after her conviction in 2003, who have never spoken publicly. We look at the Broderick children, who grew up divided on whether their mother should ever be free. And we examine why the Richins case is unlike anything that came before it — because no one else wrote the book.

These boys are preteens now. Living with their father's family. Their father set up a trust for them before he died. He was trying to protect them, without knowing how soon he'd be gone.

They will search their own story for the rest of their lives. The grief book still exists. There is no children's book for what comes next.

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This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.

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