HENDERSONVILLE, N.C. (Court TV) — Newly unsealed search warrants are offering new insight into the investigation into a woman accused of killing her own daughter by poisoning wine at Thanksgiving dinner.
Gudrun Casper-Leinenkugel is charged with two counts of murder and two counts of attempted murder. (Henderson County Sheriff’s Office)
Gudrun Casper-Leinenkugel, 53, is facing a list of charges, including two counts of murder and one count of attempted murder, and has pleaded not guilty.
Court TV reviewed newly unsealed search warrants in Casper-Leinenkugel’s case, which reveal that the defendant herself told officers that something may have been “off” with the wine she had served at Thanksgiving. Casper-Leinenkugel had hosted the dinner on Nov. 30, 2025; in attendance were her daughters, Leela Livis and Mia Lacey. Richard Pegg, Lacey’s boyfriend, was also there, as well as Landon Phillips, whom Casper-Leinenkugel identified as her boyfriend, and Jeffrey Bosch, whom Mia identified as Casper-Leinenkugel’s boyfriend in interviews with police.
Casper-Leinenkugel told officers that Livis and Pegg had both reported feeling sick the night of the dinner with “flu-like symptoms.” While Casper-Leinenkugel said that Livis, Pegg and Lacey all drank the wine, she stated “that Mia did not drink much of the wine, as Mia tasted the wine then spit it out, saying that it tasted ‘off.’ Richard and Leela consumed the rest of the wine.” In an interview with detectives, Lacey estimated she drank about a “shot glass” of the wine. She said her mother is allergic to grapes and was drinking blackberry wine instead.
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After leaving, both Livis and Pegg got sicker. Livis was found dead at her home on Dec. 1; Pegg was brought to the hospital, where he was treated for toxic levels of cyanide. Investigators have previously said they believe that Casper-Leinenkugel added the chemical acetonitrile to the wine; that chemical is converted to the deadly chemical cyanide when it’s metabolized by the human body.
Lacey also told detectives that when her mother presented the bottle of wine to the group, it had already been opened and appeared to be missing a small amount. At the hospital, Casper-Leinenkugel told a doctor that the bottle had been stored in a closet next to chemicals for the barn, including cyanide.
Detectives said they began investigating what happened by reviewing previous calls for service at the home. They found several over the last 20 years, with the most significant being in 2007, when officers were called regarding a death investigation. The death of Mischa “Michael” Schmidt was discovered by Casper-Leinenkugel, who also reported she was the last to see the victim alive when they were having drinks together.
Casper-Leinenkugel told officers that Mischa Schmidt had been a drug user and alcoholic and she had noticed he had been coughing for a few days prior to his death. At the time of his death, Mischa Schmidt lived in a camper on the same property where Casper-Leinenkugel lived in a home, but Mischa Schmidt owned the property. In the days after Mischa Schmidt’s death, deputies with the Henderson County Sheriff’s Office heard from an insurance investigator who said there had been a $25,000 policy taken out in the victim’s name five days before his death, but the “description of Mischa Schmidt from the application did not match the description of Mischa Schmidt provided by the Medical Examiner and was being flagged for review.”
In a search warrant for Casper-Leinenkugel’s phone, detectives revealed she had also claimed that she wasn’t the person who purchased acetonitrile. The defendant revealed in an interview that she would text “a subject that lived in the same house as her that she refers to as ‘Uncle Dan’ about purchasing the chemical acetonitrile from eBay. She stated that the reason she could not order the acetonitrile herself was because she had tried to log into Amazon and eBay but could not remember her passwords.”
Casper-Leinenkugel is due to return to court for a hearing on April 30. Prosecutors are not seeking the death penalty in her case.
