South Carolina paramedic allegedly poisoned his wife with Visine eye drops to collect her $250,000 life insurance
A 35-year-old South Carolina paramedic has been charged with first-degree murder after investigations proved that he fatally poisoned his wife Stacy with Visine eye drops. Joshua Lee Hunsucker even went on to collect $250,000 from his late wife Stacy Robinson Hunsucker's life insurance policy as well.
Until Joshua was accused of cheating on Stacy, 32, by his mother-in-law, Stacy's death in their home on the outskirts of Charlotte on September 23, 2018, was ruled natural.
According to the Daily Mail, Stacy's mother Suzie Robinson raised alarms about his alleged cheating and other suspicious behavior which led officials to look into him as a suspect. Joshua reportedly gave different versions of where he was before he discovered his wife's body, which was slumped on the couch in their house. He informed the investigators that he had his back to her while he was working on his computer at the kitchen table, and when he turned around he saw her slumped over on the couch.
Joshua had insisted on not performing an autopsy on the corpse, but a blood sample that was collected proved to be very crucial in the case.
A test on the sample found alarmingly high levels of tetrahydrozoline, which is commonly found in over-the-counter eye drops and nasal sprays. The amount found in her body was about 30 to 40 times higher than the therapeutic level and reportedly caused her heart to stop. Two weeks prior to Stacy's death, a nurse in South Carolina was arrested for killing her husband with eye drops, which compounded the suspicion against Joshua.
A little after Joshua collected the $250,000, Suzie began to grow suspicious of his him, especially after catching wind of the fact that he was secretly dating his girlfriend before Stacey died. Her outcry enforced an insurance fraud investigation, which saw many of Joshua's associates commenting on how unaffected he seemed by Stacy's death and how he started dating his new girlfriend less than six months after her death.
Joshua is currently being held in the Gaston County Jail in lieu of a $1.5 million bail, but according to his attorney David Teddy, the allegations against him would be "strenuously opposed." He is expected to make a court appearance on January 9.