‘Why do I hurt?' Inside the final days of a mother who was allegedly poisoned by her husband

CNN

2 days ago

Angela Craig spent her last days ill and frustrated as doctors in Colorado couldn't pinpoint why she suddenly felt sluggish despite her active lifestyle.
For nearly two weeks in 2023, family and friends saw the 43-year-old deteriorate as they drove her to hospitals and an urgent care clinic, each time returning home without answers. Craig, the youngest of 10 siblings, shared her symptoms with her family over text messages, and a close friend reviewed her vitals.
The strange symptoms lasted for 10 days, worsening to the point that she was declared brain dead. The lack of answers frustrated Craig until her last moments earthside.
Her final words were: 'Why do I hurt?' according to her sister-in-law, Renee Pray.
More than two years later, James Craig, her husband and father of the couple's six children, was convicted Wednesday of killing her, in part by poisoning her protein shakes.
The Colorado dentist was found guilty of murder and other charges, and sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole
He denied the allegations and had told others his wife had been suffering from suicidal ideations.
But testimony from Angela Craig's friends and family paints a picture of a devoted mother experiencing inexplicable, worsening health complications that frustrated and handicapped her from living the active lifestyle she loved.
On March 6, 2023, Angela Craig began her day by drinking a protein shake her husband made for her before he went off to work at his dental office in Aurora, Colorado. The couple often made them for each other, prosecutor Ryan Brackley said.
After a workout, Angela Craig was feeling sluggish and texted her husband and her older sister, Toni Kofoed, saying her brain didn't want to work, Kofoed testified. The day before, the sisters had returned home from a genealogy conference they attended together in Utah.
'My stomach feels fine, but my head feels funny and dizzy. Very strange,' Angela Craig told her husband via text, according to the probable cause affidavit.
James Craig, who was at work, stayed at his practice for a few hours before leaving to take his wife to the hospital, his office manager Caitlin Romero said in court.
At the hospital, doctors conducted several tests, including an MRI, CT scan and bloodwork, but Angela Craig was discharged after nothing was found, Brackley said.
The next day, she texted her husband and said, 'I feel drugged,' Garrett Lord, a cell phone analysis expert who testified about the Craigs' cell phone data, said in court.
Angela Craig thought she had an inner ear infection and noticed her blood sugar level was high despite not having eaten and exercising, her sister, Kofoed, testified. Angela Craig also considered it could be diabetes because there was history of it in her family.
'It makes no sense,' said one message from Angela Craig to her sister.
Around this time, text messages to the family group thread increased in frequency as Angela Craig grew concerned and frustrated without a diagnosis, her older brother, Mark Pray testified.
At some point that day, she went to an urgent care clinic but was sent home again with questions unanswered about her illness, Brackley said.
Angela Craig remained worried about having diabetes and sought the help of one of her best friends three days after she was first hospitalized.
Her friend, Nikki Harmon, testified Angela Craig asked her to check her blood sugar levels. Harmon's daughter is a diabetic so her friend knew she'd be able to help her, she said.
They became friends when their husbands were in dental school together in Kansas City. The couples also had children around the same ages.
When Harmon arrived to the Craigs' home, she recalled Angela Craig 'looked like she hadn't slept well, she wasn't made up for the day' and she was 'just kind of slumped on the couch.'
'She had a protein drink next to her,' Harmon testified. '(She) told me her husband made her the protein shake that morning before he left' and the two friends tried to calculate carbohydrates to see if that had an impact on her blood sugar, Harmon said.
Angela Craig was known to be very active and loved exercising on her stationary bike, doing yoga and Pilates, her 21-year-old daughter testified. It was unusual for her to hear that her mother was feeling so tired, she said.
Her mother described feeling 'dizzy' and 'heavy' before her symptoms worsened, and she felt 'pukey' and 'less stable on her own two feet,' the daughter said.
There was a moment that day when Angela Craig's symptoms became so severe she had to crawl across the floor to call for help because she couldn't get up on her own, said Brackley, the prosecutor.
Angela Craig went back to the hospital for her second visit in three days. This time, she was not discharged until several days later.
Angela Craig had already been at the hospital for a couple of days when her condition worsened so much that medical staff had to resuscitate her, James Craig told a woman he had an affair with, according to prosecutor Michael Mauro.
After hearing about Angela Craig's condition, Pray and his wife Renee, drove through a snowstorm to Denver to visit her and help take care of the Craig children.
When they finally got to the hospital, Angela Craig seemed better in person than James Craig made it appear to them, Pray testified. His sister was talking, her spirits seemed positive and 'she was acting fairly normal given the circumstances,' he said.
After a six-day hospital stay, Angela Craig was discharged on March 14 without answers, yet again.
Once Angela Craig got home, she could walk on her own, Pray said, but the nearly 9-mile drive from the hospital seemed to exhaust her. Still, within the hour, Angela Craig started searching online for possible causes of her symptoms, Brackley said.
'I'm shaking on the inside but I'm not shaking on the outside,' Pray testified his sister Angela Craig told him.
That evening, a video from the Craigs' kitchen security camera shows James Craig making another protein shake for his wife. However, Renee Pray testified that she didn't remember who made it or if her sister-in-law even ate that day.
The next morning James Craig texted his sister-in-law Renee Pray, asking her to give his wife a dose of clindamycin, an antibiotic used to treat bacterial infections. Angela Craig had been taking it due to a sinus infection, the prosecution said.
Mark Pray gave his sister the medicine at 10 a.m. and 'within 20 to 25 minutes, she couldn't even hold herself up,' he testified. Angela Craig was slumped over in her bed when he went back to check on her.
That's when Pray carried his youngest sibling to the car and drove her to the hospital.
On the way there Angela Craig, who was dizzy and had a severe headache, didn't understand what was happening to her, Pray explained. While they were in triage, if you weren't speaking to her, she'd pass out, he said.
James Craig, who arrived to the hospital after the siblings, had allegedly emptied a capsule of the antibiotic and refilled it with the highly lethal chemical potassium cyanide, according to prosecutor Brackley.
Angela Craig's condition continued to decline in the next three hours. She then had a seizure, experienced rapid decline and was placed on life support in the ICU.
Kristin Aubuchon, a nurse at UCHealth in Aurora who treated Angela Craig at that point, testified she had seen other patients prior to her arrival, but 'on that date she was so sick I didn't leave her room once I stepped into it.'
Angela Craig lost brain activity on March 15 but wasn't clinically determined brain dead until March 18, according to testimony from Aurora Police Department Detective Bobbi Jo Olson.
After her death, multiple samples of Angela Craig's blood taken during the hospital visits were tested.
Dr. James Brower, a forensic toxicologist with NMS Laboratories who tested the samples, testified that Angela Craig's blood from March 9 had a high and toxic level of arsenic that can cause gastrointestinal symptoms including abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, dizziness, lightheadedness and a feeling of being uncoordinated.
A sample from three days later, again, showed high levels of arsenic along with, cyanide and tetrahydrozoline, Brower said. The amount of arsenic was less than before, but showed likelihood she'd been exposed to arsenic again, he testified.
Brower also testified the blood results appeared to show 'there had to have been a second administration of cyanide in the hospital.' The chemical can cause similar symptoms to arsenic, and eventually it results in organ failure, he added during testimony.
In the wake of Angela Craig's death, her 21-year-old daughter recalled expressing concerns about her mother's illness being hereditary, to which she said her father stayed quiet.
He did however say he didn't want an autopsy to be performed on her mother to 'satisfy their curiosities,' she testified, though it's unclear who he was referring to.
During the emotional testimony, the Craigs' daughters denied their mother could have taken her own life. For them, Angela Craig struggled 'like anyone else' but was mostly frustrated over not knowing what was wrong with her.
CNN's Melissa Gray, Celina Tebor and Cindy Von Quednow contributed to this report.