Who is Joshua Hunsucker? Man accused of poisoning wife with eye drops arrested for starting fire on helicopter
GASTON COUNTY, NORTH CAROLINA: On Monday, 37-year-old Joshua Hunsucker was arrested for allegedly setting fire to medical equipment while aboard a helicopter. While awaiting trial after being accused of fatally poisoning his wife in 2018, the North Carolina man was only arrested recently.
According to the latest reports, Hunsucker was arrested in relation to a November 26, 2019 fire, where he was a paramedic on board an Atrium Health flight when a fire broke out, forcing the helicopter’s pilot to perform an emergency landing. He has been accused of setting a syringe pump on fire and intentionally starting the blaze.
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Online jail records reveal that Hunsucker is facing a felony charge of burning personal property. On Tuesday, he was reportedly released on $50,000 bond and is expected to return to court for a probable cause hearing on May 18, 2021.
Death of his wife
During his arrest on Tuesday, Hunsucker was already on bond awaiting trial on charges of allegedly killing his wife.
In December 2019, just weeks after the helicopter fire incident, Hunsucker was arrested and charged with the murder of his wife Stacy Robinson Hunsucker, who was found dead in their home on the outskirts of Charlotte on September 23, 2018. Authorities said that he laced his wife's water with eye drops, exposing her to deadly amounts of Tetrahydrozoline, an ingredient commonly found in eye drops, to kill her, according to a WTVD-TV report.
Who is Joshua Hunsucker?
MEAWW earlier reported that after the death of his wife, Hunsucker went on to collect $250,000 from his late wife Stacy's life insurance policy.
After the husband and father-of-two claimed this amount and went on to buy expensive items, her family grew suspicious. These over-the-top items included him getting a boat, and embarking on numerous vacations with his girlfriend. It was Stacy's mother who accused him of cheating with a woman even before her death.
Things took a turn for the worse for Hunsucker when he started giving different accounts about how he came to discover the body of his wife. He had also reportedly refused to have the medical examiner’s office perform an autopsy on her, claiming that he didn’t want her to be “cut up". And had her remains cremated soon. But a small collected sample of blood proved to be a very crucial breakthrough in the case. Tests on the blood found alarmingly high levels of Tetrahydrozoline.
At the time of his wife's death, Hunsucker had worked with Atrium Health's MedCenter Air since 2013. He was fired in 2019, according to WCNC.
Some people close to the couple had revealed that they had been together since high school - and apparently, everybody thought they were a happy couple. According to a search warrant affidavit obtained by ABC News, his colleagues allegedly told investigators that Hunsucker seemed "unaffected" by his wife's death. He also apparently quickly moved in with his new girlfriend.
Charges against Hunsucker
Hunsucker is reportedly facing charges of first-degree murder, insurance fraud, and obtaining property by false pretenses greater than $100,000 in connection to his wife’s death, according to the latest report in WCNC. His attorney has reportedly declined to comment on the new charges relating to the helicopter fire.