Victim or manipulator? Colorado dentist’s murder trial paints dueling portraits of wife in troubled marriage

As prosecutors attempted to paint a Colorado dentist as a calculated killer who poisoned his wife to pursue a new romantic life, the defense took a dramatically different route by portraying his wife of 23 years as emotionally manipulative and mentally unstable.

Dr. James Toliver Craig, 47, is charged with first-degree murder in the March 2023 death of his wife, Angela Craig, a 43-year-old mother of six. Her cause of death was determined to be lethal doses of cyanide and tetrahydrozoline.

In opening statements Tuesday in Colorado, defense attorney Ashley Whitham acknowledged the couple’s rocky 23-year marriage but described Angela not as a victim of betrayal, but as someone who was emotionally broken, deeply private and at times manipulative.

“You’re going to hear her own daughter describe her that she was also manipulating words,” Whitham revealed to jurors Tuesday. “Again, that if she wanted to try to get something, she would be manipulative.”

Investigators alleged in court documents obtained by Fox News Digital that, in the weeks before his wife’s hospitalization and death, Craig used a dental office computer to search for “undetectable poisons” and how to obtain them, later purchasing arsenic and cyanide by mail, “how many grams of pure arsenic will kill a human” and “is arsenic detectable in an autopsy?”

Alongside these online searches, investigators alleged Craig made YouTube queries such as “how to make poison” and “Top 5 Undetectable Poisons That Show No Signs of Foul Play.”

Fox News Digital has reached out to James Craig’s lead attorney, Lisa Fine Moses, for comment.