Charged with wife's murder, man fakes kidnapping, poisons ...

GASTON COUNTY, N.C. (Court TV) — A former paramedic in North Carolina, who now stands accused not only of murdering his wife and poisoning his daughter, is due in court on Monday for a bond hearing as he tries to get released from jail.

Joshua Hunsucker, 40, is charged with the first-degree murder of his wife, Stacy Robinson Hunsucker, who died on Sept. 23, 2018. When Stacy died, Joshua told people that she died of a heart attack and immediately had her cremated. He also filed a claim for a $250,000 life insurance payout just days after his wife’s death, according to court documents.

Stacy had been an organ donor, and as a result, a vial of her blood was kept in a file. Investigators tested the blood, citing Joshua’s odd behavior, and found that she had been poisoned with tetrahydrozoline, found in eyedrops.

In a bond motion reviewed by Court TV, prosecutors said that before Stacy’s death, Joshua “told two former co-workers that if he killed someone, he would do so using Visine or other eyedrops.”

Investigators say that Joshua, believing police were closing in on him for his wife’s murder, began behaving erratically to shift attention away from himself. On Nov. 26, 2019, days before he was arrested, Joshua allegedly set fire to a medical helicopter while he was on board working as a paramedic. The helicopter made an emergency landing. Joshua is facing charges of burning personal property in that incident.

Days after he was arrested and charged with his wife’s murder, Joshua bonded out of jail on Dec. 24, 2019. Prosecutors say on Feb. 4, 2023, Joshua again tried to distract from his case when he staged his own kidnapping and assault. Joshua told police that he had stopped to change a flat tire in Mount Holly when he was pistol-whipped in the head, zip-tied and injected with an unknown substance. Joshua told police that his attacker was John Robinson, his wife’s father.

Police found no evidence that Robinson attacked Joshua, but rather discovered that Joshua had been stalking and harassing his former in-laws. The harassment included driving by their home, following him to businesses and sending packages to their home.

At a July hearing, a judge determined that Joshua had been neglecting both of his children, ages 9 and 11 and that he had abused the 11-year-old. Prosecutors say Joshua poisoned the 11-year-old by putting tetrahydrozoline into her drink. The child, identified as P.H. in court documents, was taken to the hospital with low blood pressure, low heart rate, extreme exhaustion, and constricted blood vessels. Prosecutors said that in addition to tetrahydrozoline, O-desmethylvenlafaxine, a drug commonly prescribed for depression and not approved for use in children, was also found in P.H.’s system. The same drug was found in Joshua’s truck.

Court TV has covered a murder involving eyedrops before: Jessy Kurczewski was convicted of killing her friend, Lynn Hernan, who died of tetrahydrozoline poisoning. In that case, Kurczewski had claimed that the victim enjoyed drinking the solution.

Joshua is due back in court on Oct. 7 for a bond hearing on the new charges related to his daughter’s alleged poisoning.