A Connecticut mom is accused of poisoning her estranged husband with antifreeze as the pair was locked in a bitter custody battle for their children.
Kristen Hogan, 33, was arrested in Ridgefield and charged with two counts of attempted murder and one count of interfering with an officer on Friday, according to documents released by the Connecticut State Police.
Hogan allegedly poisoned wine and iced tea at her estranged husband’s home with ethylene glycol, the main ingredient in antifreeze.
Her husband — who was not named in court documents — drank a “small amount” of wine stored in his fridge on Aug. 10, but soon realized something was wrong after repeatedly waking up sick throughout the night.
The next day, he continued to vomit and feel ill, so he called his father, who advised him to have his mother, who was nearby, check on him.
His mother arrived and found him “slurring his words, staggering, and vomiting,” then immediately rushed him to the hospital.
At the hospital, doctors initially suspected a stroke, but after monitoring his symptoms, they identified signs of ethylene glycol poisoning.
He was transferred to the ICU and placed on dialysis for renal failure, where he informed doctors about drinking the wine.
The bottle of wine was initially opened five days before he fell ill while having people over for a dinner party. It was then corked and stored in his refrigerator.
The husband then met with Ridgefield Police detectives and told them he believed Hogan had poisoned the wine on Aug. 7, the day he was supposed to meet Hogan at a court hearing, which she never showed up for.
While he was at court, he received an alert showing Hogan’s cellphone had connected to his Wi-Fi and uploaded data.
The father explained that Hogan, with whom he shares a child, had full, unrestricted access to the home.
He also told investigators she was “the last person other than himself to be in the residence prior to him drinking the already opened wine.”
Hogan initially denied wrongdoing when confronted by police.
Detectives seized the wine and submitted it to the Connecticut Forensic Laboratory, where it tested positive for ethylene glycol.
Investigators also found that Hogan’s cellphone contained searches for several toxic substances — including “potassium cyanide” and “monoethylene glycol” — as well as questions about “how much of these substances would kill you.”
She then claimed she “was confused about the chemicals and then stated she recognized the word cyanide from the television show ‘Psych,’” according to the arrest affidavit.
Hogan also acknowledged buying a bottle of monoethylene glycol in late July, but insisted “she was using that specific chemical to clean the carpet at her mother’s house.”
When questioned about the bottle of wine and her husband testing positive for ethylene glycol, she denied poisoning the wine.
Eventually, she confessed to mixing the toxic liquid into her estranged husband’s wine, allegedly stating that she “never wanted to kill him but just wanted to make him sick as payback for being mentally abusive.”
“Hogan stated she did not know how much ethylene glycol she put into his drink, but stated it was not much but she just poured it in,” according to the affidavit.
“[An investigating officer] then asked how much wine was in the bottle, to which she stated it was mostly full. Hogan described the wine as the color red and confessed to bringing the bottle of ethylene glycol and dumped an unknown amount into the wine bottle.”
Detectives also informed Hogan that their child, who she shares with her estranged husband, may have potentially consumed some of the poison, which she “adamantly denied” being possible.
However, their child was hospitalized in late September for symptoms similar to those of his father.
“Hogan stated it was only the wine and the iced tea, and nobody else knew she was tampering with [the victim’s] drinks,” the arrest affidavit said.
Her estranged husband told police he believes her motive for poisoning him was “the fact that Hogan would become the full owner of the residence and would gain full-time custody of their child.”
Hogan is currently being held on a $1 million bond.
