A Wisconsin woman has been accused of poisoning her friend with a lethal dose of eyedrops after stealing thousands of dollars from the victim. The killer also allegedly tried to make the death seem like a suicidal overdose, authorities said.
Jessy Kurczewski, 37, was been charged with homicide and two counts of felony theft on Friday for the harrowing murder. She is being held on a $1 million bail at the Waukesha County Jail, reported Fox News.
According to the criminal complaint, Kurczewski reportedly called the police to her friend's home in Meadow Grass Circle, Pewaukee in 2018 alerting that her friend was unresponsive and seemingly wasn't breathing.
Authorities arrived to find the victim dead on the scene, lying in a living room recliner next to a table full of prescription pills and what appeared to be crushed medication on her chest. The victim's name has been withheld from the criminal complaint.
The case was initially ruled as a drug overdose. Kurczewski, at the time, had claimed that her close friend was suicidal and suffered mood swings. She did not rebuff the possibility that the victim might have deliberately committed suicide.
However, family and other friends close to the victim reportedly said that she had never given them the impression of being partial to self-harm, and that they didn't believe she "would intentionally or unintentionally overdose," the criminal complaint further stated.
In a toxicology report after the victim's autopsy, Waukesha County Medical Examiner Dr. Linda Biedrzycki reported that the woman may have been fed a fatal dose of tetrahydrozoline, the main ingredient used in eyedrops, after the chemical was found in staggering amounts in her body.
The report revealed that the woman had 160 nanograms per milliliter of tetrahydrozoline in her body, an amount impossible to have in a person's system by just using eye droplets externally, reported ABC News.
In September 2019, Biedrzycki dismissed suicide or accidental overdose as potential causes of the victim’s death and ruled the case a homicide.
After being confronted by authorities with the release of the toxicology report, a distraught Kurczewski reportedly rebuffed investigators saying that it was the victim who possibly staged her own suicide scene with the crushed pills after ingesting the eyedrops, New York Post reported.
At the time, Kurczewski told authorities that she brought her friend a water bottle loaded with six bottles' worth of Visine. Kurczewski also told the officers that she "didn't think" it would kill the victim because the victim had been "drinking it regularly for so long," the complaint stated.
On July 9, 2019, a search warrant was served at Kurczewski's residence. She has since been arrested and placed on a probation and parole hold at the Waukesha County Jail.
During the investigation, authorities got wind of Kurczewski's dubious finances. Officers concluded that Kurczewski had committed more than $290,000 in fraud in 2019. Out of this, $130,204 is believed to have been "transferred fraudulently" by check from the slain victim to Kurczewski, WGN-TV reported.
"The amount was arrived at based on the different places of credit card activity, the amounts, the frequency of use and based on the continued activity after the victim's death," the complaint said.
Court records do not indicate whether Kurczewski has been appointed a lawyer.
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