A woman allegedly poisoned and killed her friend with eye drops after stealing nearly $300,000 from her. Jessy Kurczewski, 37, is accused of murdering her friend and making it seem like her death was a suicide.

Kurczewski called police on October 3, 2019, and said her unnamed friend was not breathing in her home in Pewaukee, Wisconsin, prosecutors said.

A Waukesha County sheriff’s deputy who arrived at the scene found an unconscious woman on a recliner with a ‘large amount of crushed medication on her chest and a plate directly to the left of her with a large amount of what appeared to be crushed up medication still on the plate’, according to WITI.

Investigators were led to believe that the woman died of a drug overdose, a complaint states. They later found out that Kurczewski, who said she was her friend’s power of attorney, had been caring for the victim and had keys to her home.

Another friend of the victim told investigators he ‘did not believe her death was a drug overdose’ and that Kurczewski had a hand in it.

The victim’s autopsy showed she had a fatal overdose of tetrahydrozoline, a main ingredient in eye drops. It would be ‘impossible to have that level of tetrahydrozoline in the blood just by using it in the eyes’, the Waukesha County medical examiner stated.

Investigators conducted a search warrant on Kurczewski’s home in July 2019 and arrested her. In her interview, Kurczewski said she did not give her friend eye drops and ‘adamantly denied’ killing her.

The home of the unnamed victim in Pewaukee, Wisconsin (left). A mugshot of Jessy Kurczewski (middle). A bottle of Visine eye drops (right).
Jessy Kurczewski (middle) allegedly called cops to her friend’s home (left) and said she saw her drink Visine eye drops (right) before her death (Pictures: WITI/Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department/Wikipedia)

Kurczewski added that her friend ‘must have staged her own suicide with the crushed pills’. The next day, Kurczewski said she saw her friend ‘drink Visine with vodka before her death’. But the following day, Kurczewski said she gave her friend a water bottle containing six Visine bottles because the victim asked for it.

Prosecutors said that Kurczewski committed more than $290,210 in fraud, including over $130,000 ‘transferred fraudulently’ by check from the victim.

Kurczewski was charged with first-degree intentional homicide and two counts of felony theft on Friday. She appeared in Waukesha County court on Monday and her cash bond was set at $1million. Her preliminary hearing has been scheduled for June 25.