Grand Rapids Man Charged In Wife’s Overdose Death

GRAND RAPIDS. (AP) - Prosecutors have charged a northern Minnesota man with murder in his wife's drug overdose death.

Forty-nine-year-old Terry Wayne Richards of Grand Rapids appeared in Itasca County court Monday on a third-degree murder charge.

According to the complaint, Richards told an investigator he had bought a fentanyl patch. After extracting the drug from the patch, the complaint says Richards said he and his wife both injected fentanyl - a synthetic form of morphine - on Wednesday. Richards said he later prepared two syringes filled with the drug, and he and his wife injected themselves again.

Officers were called to the couple's home Friday night and found Richards' wife had no pulse. She was pronounced dead at a hospital.

Richards is in jail. His attorney did not immediately return a phone message.