Day 3: Crime scene tech to return Thursday in Kouri Richins murder trial
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Emily Ashcraft, KSL
PARK CITY, Utah (KSL) — Chelsea Gipson, a crime scene investigation technician, returned to the witness stand Wednesday to testify about evidence she helped collect at the home of Kouri Richins.
But after roughly an hour of testimony, 3rd District Judge Richard Mrazik said he had a scheduling conflict and called for an hour break. After that, the break went longer than planned, he returned and excused the jurors for the day and told Gipson she would return to testify on Thursday.
She testified Tuesday that she went to the home on eight different occasions and took photos, scans and evidence, including the morning Eric Richins died, about a month later and after Kouri Richins was arrested on May 8, 2023.
Gipson has already talked about prescription bottles, phones, THC edibles and a set of tweezers found in a woman’s jacket pocket. The significance of the tweezers has not yet been explained, but prosecutors asked that the tweezers and four phones be turned over to the court so they could be provided to the jurors when the trial reaches deliberations.
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On Wednesday, defense attorney Kathy Nester asked her questions about her general duties and process for keeping evidence. She asked Gipson why she took a bedsheet into evidence from Eric Richins’ bedroom and how she accessed the 911 call Kouri Richins made to report that he was not breaking and cold.
Kouri Richins, a Kamas mother and real estate agent who published a children’s book about grief, is charged with aggravated murder and attempted murder, first-degree felonies, in addition to other crimes, accusing her of killing her husband, Eric Richins, with a fatal dose of fentanyl on March 4, 2022. She is also accused of slipping fentanyl in his food, making him sick, on Feb. 14, 2022.