Death Penalty News

PARK CITY, Utah (DPN) — Kouri Richins, a Utah real estate agent who authored a children’s book about grief after her husband’s death, received a life sentence without the possibility of parole Wednesday for poisoning him with a fatal dose of fentanyl. Third District Judge Richard Mrazik imposed the maximum penalty on what would have been Eric Richins’ 44th birthday. Kouri Richins, 36, remained largely impassive as the judge delivered the ruling in a Park City courtroom.

PARK CITY, Utah (AP) — A Utah mother who published a children’s book about grief after the death of her husband and was later found guilty of killing him finds out Wednesday how long she will spend in prison. Kouri Richins was convicted in March of aggravated murder for lacing her husband’s cocktail with five times the lethal dose of fentanyl at their home near Park City in 2022. Prosecutors said Richins, a 35-year-old real estate agent with a house-flipping business, was millions in debt and planning a future with another man. She had opened numerous life insurance policies on her husband Eric Richins without his knowledge and falsely believed she would inherit his estate worth more than $4 million after he died.

AMERICAN FORK, Utah (DPN) — Law enforcement officials confirmed Wednesday that forensic evidence has linked serial killer Ted Bundy to the remains of a teenager discovered more than 50 years ago in American Fork Canyon. The breakthrough, finalized in April 2026, concludes one of Utah’s oldest unidentified persons cases. The victim, whose identity is being withheld pending full family notification, was a teenager reported missing from the Wasatch Front in 1974.

Utah families should not have to wait three or four decades for justice after unthinkable tragedies, a state lawmaker told colleagues Wednesday. She pitched a plan she said would shorten the timeline on death penalty cases while still respecting the rights of Utahns on death row.  Rep. Candice Pierruci reminded colleagues in the Utah House of Representatives that Ralph Menzies died of natural causes rather than an execution in December after 37 years on death row for the murder of Maureen Hunsaker. He exhausted appeals but was later diagnosed with dementia, and questions about his mental capacity were still being sorted out in court when he died.

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah death row inmates routinely spend three decades or more awaiting execution, with some dying of natural causes before their sentences can be carried out. One Republican lawmaker says the system is broken and is pushing legislation to accelerate the appeals process. Rep. Candice Pierucci, R-Herriman, sponsor of  House Bill 495, told a House committee on Feb. 19, 2026, that prolonged delays undermine the death penalty's purpose and burden taxpayers with indefinite appeals. She cited the case of Ralph Menzies, who spent 36 years on death row before dying of natural causes last year after his scheduled firing squad execution was halted over competency concerns.

Judge was set to consider arguments in December about Menzies’ mental fitness  Ralph Menzies, who spent more than 3 decades on Utah’s death row for the 1986 murder of Maurine Hunsaker, has died.  Menzies, 67, died of “presumed natural causes at a local hospital” Wednesday afternoon, according to the Utah Department of Corrections.  Matt Hunsaker, Maurine Hunsaker’s son, said Menzies’ death “was a complete surprise.”  “First off, I’d say that I’m numb. And second off, I would say, grateful,” Hunsaker told Utah News Dispatch. “I’m grateful that my family does not have to endure this for the holidays.” 

WEST JORDAN, Utah — A mental competency report prepared by a psychologist from Utah's Department of Health & Human Services has found that Ralph Leroy Menzies is incompetent to be executed by firing squad. A copy of the report, filed in West Jordan's 3rd District Court and obtained by FOX 13 News on Friday, declared that Menzies' dementia is so bad that he cannot be restored to any competency to be put to death. "This condition impacts Mr. Menzies' cognitive abilities such that he is unaware of the crime for which he is convicted, the parameters of the case (e.g., victim's identity, specifics acts he was found to have committed, etc.), the capital nature of the sentence he received, or how the punishment will be carried out," the Utah Department of Health & Human Services' evaluator, Dr. Michael Brooks, wrote.

A man on death row in South Carolina is scheduled to be executed by firing squad COLUMBIA, S.C. -- A man in South Carolina is scheduled to be executed Friday by a firing squad, the third person to die by that method in the state this year. Three prison employees, all with live ammunition, have volunteered to carry out the execution of Stephen Bryant, 44, who killed three people in five days in a rural area of the state in 2004. Bryant has no appeals pending before the 6 p.m. scheduled execution at the death row facility at Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia.

A state law shields its source of pentobarbital, the sedative used in lethal injections. But documents reviewed by NBC News offer a glimpse into its most recent supply. Texas, which historically drives the number of executions nationwide, is approaching a grim milestone of 600 people put to death by lethal injection since the early 1980s. But for the past 10 years, a shield statute meant to protect the safety of those participating in the execution protocol has allowed the state to withhold a telling piece of information: where Texas is finding pentobarbital, the hard-to-get drug it exclusively uses to carry out executions.

The Utah County prosecutor announced Tuesday he will seek the death penalty against the man accused of gunning down the founder of Turning Point USA Charlie Kirk during a public event at Utah Valley University on September 10. Tyler James Robinson, 22, appeared in court by video from the county jail wearing a green suicide-prevention smock. He spoke only to confirm his name as Utah 4th District Court Judge Tony Graf read the charges against him. The office of Utah County District Attorney Jeffrey Gray charged Robinson with seven criminal counts including aggravated murder, felony discharge of a firearm causing serious bodily injury, two counts of obstruction of justice, two counts of witness tampering and committing a violent offense in the presence of a child. He is being held without bail.

The cap­i­tal charges filed against Tyler Robinson, the man accused of killing con­ser­v­a­tive polit­i­cal activist Charlie Kirk on September 10th, have drawn new atten­tion to Utah’s death penal­ty. Although Utah was among the first states to rein­state the death penal­ty after it was inval­i­dat­ed by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1972, and the first to per­form an exe­cu­tion in the mod­ern era, exe­cu­tions have been rare over the last 50 years. Just eight peo­ple have been exe­cut­ed in Utah since 1977. In 2024, the state exe­cut­ed Taberon Honie, end­ing a 14-year hia­tus in exe­cu­tions. Utah juries have sen­tenced 26 peo­ple to death in the mod­ern era but have not done so since 2008.

Kirk, a close ally of President Donald Trump, was shot dead last week during an event on a Utah university campus. The suspect in the killing of Charlie Kirk appeared in court Tuesday, charged with the conservative activist’s murder, as prosecutors said they were seeking the death penalty for a crime that has shaken the United States. Kirk, a close ally of President Donald Trump and the founder of student activism group Turning Point USA, was shot dead last week during an event on a Utah university campus.

‘Time is of the essence’ the state claims, after supreme court ruling triggers more hearings and evaluations The Utah Supreme Court called off the execution of Ralph Menzies last week nearly 40 years after he murdered Maurine Hunsaker, opening the door for more court hearings and evaluations to determine the extent of the 67-year-old’s dementia.   Now, the Utah Attorney General’s Office is asking the court to move as quickly as possible, warning of an “endless cycle” of petitions pointing to Menzies’ mental decline. 

The impending execution of a man by firing squad in Utah was blocked by the state’s Supreme Court on Friday after his attorneys argued he should be spared because he has dementia. Ralph Leroy Menzies, 67, was set to be executed Sept. 5 for abducting and killing Utah mother of three Maurine Hunsaker in 1986. When given a choice decades ago, Menzies selected a firing squad as his method of execution. He would have become only the sixth US prisoner executed by firing squad since 1977.

As the days tick down to Ralph Menzies’ execution, anti-death penalty advocates said Friday that a firing squad leaves open the possibility for human error and potential suffering.  Menzies is scheduled to die on Sept. 5 for kidnapping and murdering Maurine Hunsaker in 1986 — he is still awaiting a ruling from the Utah Supreme Court, which is considering whether his dementia warrants a pause in execution proceedings for a new competency evaluation.  If the execution does happen, it would be the 4th firing squad the U.S. has seen in 15 years, and just the 6th since executions resumed in 1977.

In what is being described as the “last big hurdle” before his Sept. 5 execution, attorneys for death row inmate Ralph Menzies argued before the Utah Supreme Court that the state should pause proceedings and give the 67-year-old convicted killer with dementia another review to see if he is competent.   Menzies — sentenced to die by firing squad for the 1986 kidnapping and murder of 26-year-old Maurine Hunsaker — is running out of appeals. His death warrant has been signed, the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole recently denied him clemency and his execution is now almost two weeks away. 

Court documents share new details of deadly Tremonton shooting Prosecutors will pursue the death penalty against the man accused of shooting and killing two Tremonton-Garland police officers and wounding a third sheriff’s deputy and his service dog, according to court documents filed Wednesday that shed new light on the shooting.  Ryan Michael Bate, 32, is now facing 20 separate charges for the shooting that rocked the small, northern Utah community of Tremonton Sunday night — that includes two counts of aggravated murder for the deaths of Tremonton-Garland Police Sgt. Lee Sorensen and officer Eric Estrada.

The Utah Board of Pardons and Parole has denied Ralph Menzies’ request for clemency, one of the death row inmate’s final appeals ahead of his execution scheduled for Sept. 5.  The announcement came Tuesday afternoon, four days after the commutation hearing for the 67-year-old inmate, where board members heard arguments for and against granting Menzies mercy.  Menzies is scheduled to die by firing squad after spending nearly four decades in prison for the 1986 murder of Maurine Hunsaker, a 26-year-old gas station clerk whom Menzies kidnapped. Hunsaker was brought up Big Cottonwood Canyon, where Menzies tied her to a tree, strangled her, then slashed her throat.

SALT LAKE CITY —  Recent changes to state law keep Utahns in the dark when it comes to certain information about the state’s death penalty process. As death row inmate Ralph Menzies’ attorneys are pursuing several legal efforts to prevent his execution by firing squad, the Utah Department of Corrections is preparing to carry out his death sentence. Menzies, 67, is scheduled to be executed on Sept. 5 by firing squad for the 1986 kidnapping and murder of 26-year-old Maurine Hunsaker. The mother of three was found deceased in Big Cottonwood Canyon two days after Menzies abducted her from a gas station in Kearns.

With lethal injection drugs proving both costly and difficult to obtain, a growing number of Republican lawmakers and state officials are pushing for an alternative: the firing squad. Lethal injection is currently the only method of execution authorized under Indiana law. After a yearslong pause, the state resumed executions in December, using a single-drug protocol of pentobarbital to put Joseph Corcoran to death. A second execution followed in May, when Benjamin Ritchie was executed with the same drug. Together, they marked Indiana’s first executions since 2009.