Cops: Man Killed Wife With Heroin-Laced Cereal

Charges come 5 years after Christina Harris' death
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted Aug 28, 2019 9:01 AM CDT
Man Allegedly Killed Wife With Heroin-Laced Cereal
Stock photo.   (Getty Images/JADEZMITH)

A month after Christina Harris was found dead at her Michigan home on Sept. 29, 2014, her death was ruled an accidental heroin overdose. That left many questions since none of the woman's friends and family knew her to use heroin. And though her husband had been fired from his factory job for testing positive for drugs, there were none found in frozen breast milk reserved for the 36-year-old mother's 4-month-old baby, reports the Washington Post. Five years later, police believe they can provide answers. "We believe Jason Harris murdered his wife" when "he put heroin into her cereal and milk … thinking it would be tasteless and odorless much like he had asked his coworkers multiple times," Genesee County Prosecutor David Leyton tells MLive. Harris, 44, allegedly told a neighbor Christina had passed out after eating the cereal he prepared for her the night before.

A five-year investigation has since revealed Harris not only offered $5,000 to two people to kill his wife and made comments to his siblings about "getting rid" of her, but admitted to coworkers that he put Xanax in her water and sought other pills to knock her out "so she would not feel anything," Leyton said. What's more, Christina "told a friend that if something happens to me, look at Jason," who received at least $120,000 in life insurance money. Police say Harris also booked a flight to visit a woman with whom he'd exchanged thousands of text messages within days of his wife's death. A woman also moved into the couple's home after two months. Harris' lawyer says his client "looks forward to contesting these charges." He's pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder, solicitation of murder and delivery of a controlled substance causing death. (More murder stories.)

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