Freed Richey told me he did kill toddler, claims ex-wife
A SCOT who spent 21 years on death row before being released could be re-investigated by police over fresh claims he murdered a toddler in the US.
Kenny Richey, who is originally from Edinburgh, is alleged to have ‘confessed’ to killing two-year-old Cynthia Collins in 1987 in Ohio after setting fire to an apartment.
The allegations were made by Richey’s former wife Karen Charves, who lives in Mississippi.
She claimed the Scot – who came within an hour of being sent to the electric chair – started the fire by throwing a lit cigarette and a box of matches behind a sofa. She also claims he ‘bragged’ over the death of the child after he was released from prison. Richey, 53, has always maintained his innocence but according to Miss Charves he made the comments during an alcoholfuelled exchange.
Speaking to the Scottish Daily Mail, she also vowed to give evidence against him if prosecutors re-open his case.
‘I would have no problems testifying,’ she said. ‘I could tell you things that would make your skin crawl. He not only told me when he was drunk that he knew the little girl was in the apartment when he set the fire, he told others.
‘I found out he had been boasting all over town about being a bad guy. You don’t do that in places like Mississippi, we’re Godfearing people.
‘After I finally got him to leave, a friend of a friend asked me if my husband was Scottish and if he had set a fire that had killed a little girl. I was like “How did you know that?” Turns out he was bragging in a bar.’
Miss Charves, 59, struck up an online romance with Richey and they married on Christmas Eve 2014. The relationship lasted less than a year.
‘He preys on women and children,’ she said. ‘He constantly threatened me. He showed my children pornographic images.
‘He followed my daughter and scared the s*** out of her. I went to the police about that but they said it was only a misdemeanour and it would be really traumatising for her to go to trial.’
Former US Marine Richey was originally sentenced to death in 1987 for killing Cynthia, who died in the fire at her mother’s apartment in Columbus Grove, Ohio. He claimed it was a miscarriage of justice and was eventually freed in 2008 after entering a ‘no contest’ plea to manslaughter, child endangering and breaking and entering in a plea bargain.
Richey, who was born to a Scottish mother and American father, immediately flew back to the UK and lived in Edinburgh for some time. Later he moved back to the US and lived in Tupelo, Mississippi with Miss Charves.
She decided to reveal his alleged confession when he refused to give her a divorce. ‘I told him if he didn’t sign the divorce papers that I would expose him and he would go back to prison,’ she said.
‘He promised he would, but he just scribbled all over them and sent them back to me. I don’t know why he won’t sign. It’s not like we are going to get back together.
‘In Mississippi I have to be divorced so I can change my name legally on my driver’s licence and bank accounts.
‘Even my phone is in his name and I can’t change it.
‘I have tried to speak to the sheriff and prosecutor in Ohio and I hope they will get back to me because I want to testify. I refuse to be another victim of Kenny Richey.’
It is understood that prosecutors may decide to reopen the investigation into Richey, who now lives in Columbus, Ohio. Sheriff Brian Siefker of Putnam County Police said: ‘It’s in the hands of the county prosecutor.
‘It will be his decision on whether or not he wants to reopen the investigation. I am waiting to hear back from him.’
Speaking to the Scottish Sun, Richey responded to Miss Charves’s allegations, saying: ‘She’s lying as usual. She is determined to stick it to me any way she can.’
Richey’s brother Tom is currently serving a 65-year jail term for murder in the US.
He was convicted of shooting two people in Tacoma, Washington, while high on LSD.
One of them, a shop assistant, died in the shooting, which happened in 1986.
‘I could tell you things to make your skin crawl’