NC - Restaurant owner charged with murdering 2 people by putting poison in their drinks - Hendersonville, arrested 16 Jan 2026

[Clearsky]

Former Restaurant Owner Charged with Murder On Allegations She Slipped Deadly Poison into Someone's Drink

Gudrun Casper-Leinenkugel, 52, allegedly put a clear, colorless solvent with a sweet-smelling odor into four people’s drinks, authorities allege.

people.com

On Friday, Jan. 16, Gudrun Casper-Leinenkugel, 52, of Hendersonville, was arrested and charged with murder in connection with the death of Leela Livis, 32, on Dec. 1, 2025, and with the attempted murders of Richard Pegg and Mia Lacey, the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) said in a statement.

 

[Spectrix]

What an interesting crime.
I'm keen to find out what connection she had with the victims, as well as motive.

From the article above -

Gudrun Casper-Leinenkugel, 52, was arrested and charged with murder in connection with the death of Leela Livis, 32, on Dec. 1, 2025, and with the attempted murders of Richard Pegg and Mia Lacey, the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) said in a statement.

Detectives also found evidence allegedly linking Casper-Leinenkugel to the 2007 death of Michael Schmidt in Henderson County the SBI alleged in the statement.

Acetonitrile, according to the EPA, is a clear, colorless liquid “with a sweet ethereal odor” that is used mainly as a solvent in the manufacture of pharmaceuticals, for spinning fibers and for the casting and molding of plastic materials in lithium batteries.

According to the NIH, acetonitrile is slowly converted to cyanide, which results in “delayed toxicity.”

--

 

[azure]

What an interesting crime.
I'm keen to find out what connection she had with the victims, as well as motive.

From the article above -

Gudrun Casper-Leinenkugel, 52, was arrested and charged with murder in connection with the death of Leela Livis, 32, on Dec. 1, 2025, and with the attempted murders of Richard Pegg and Mia Lacey, the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) said in a statement.

Detectives also found evidence allegedly linking Casper-Leinenkugel to the 2007 death of Michael Schmidt in Henderson County the SBI alleged in the statement.

Acetonitrile, according to the EPA, is a clear, colorless liquid “with a sweet ethereal odor” that is used mainly as a solvent in the manufacture of pharmaceuticals, for spinning fibers and for the casting and molding of plastic materials in lithium batteries.

According to the NIH, acetonitrile is slowly converted to cyanide, which results in “delayed toxicity.”

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Leela Livis is the suspect's daughter! And the surviving victims are the daughter's boyfriend and the suspect's other daughter!

Woman accused of killing daughter with poisonous wine

Officials said the woman was linked to two separate murder cases that took place in 2025 and 2007.

www.foxcarolina.com

In Tuesday’s bond hearing, the state said Casper-Leinenkugel held a 12-person Thanksgiving dinner in Nov. 2025 where she poisoned the wine that her daughter, Leela Livis, another daughter and the her daughter’s boyfriend were drinking. All three drank from the same bottle poisoned with acetonitrile.

 

[Spectrix]

People please, y'all need to stop killing your children. What's the point of giving them the gift of life in the first place if you're going to take it away again?

 

[Scatcat]

Just nuts, but fascinating!

 

[Stunned]

This is all pretty local to me and this is the first I'm hearing about it! How awful for this family and everyone involved!

 

[scaredtopost]

Maybe it's just the closeness of the picture, but this lady looks super scary. JMO

 

[MissPie]

This is all pretty local to me and this is the first I'm hearing about it! How awful for this family and everyone involved!

Ditto! There sure wasn’t anything in the local news that I saw. Weird.

 

[Herat]

I was expecting it to be ethylene glycol, so acetonitrile is a surprise.

It is not easy to get and one would likely need some kind of chemicals or analysis background to be able to order it. It is not something that a restaurant owner would be using, or be familiar with. I assume the mother, G C-L will have interesting computer search results when examined by LE.

From AI:

How does one get acetonitrile: Buy from chemical supply companies (like Sigma-Aldrich, Fisher Scientific) if you need it for lab work or specific applications, but expect hazardous material surcharges and regulations.

 

[tlcya]

Leela Livis is the suspect's daughter! And the surviving victims are the daughter's boyfriend and the suspect's other daughter!

Woman accused of killing daughter with poisonous wine

Officials said the woman was linked to two separate murder cases that took place in 2025 and 2007.

www.foxcarolina.com

what on earth???

 

[everlearning]

Leela Livis is the suspect's daughter! And the surviving victims are the daughter's boyfriend and the suspect's other daughter!

Woman accused of killing daughter with poisonous wine

Officials said the woman was linked to two separate murder cases that took place in 2025 and 2007.

www.foxcarolina.com

For the love of Pete. What in the whirl!? And all those other deaths!

 

[Herat]

Yup. The computer search found it.

 

[bestill]

Leela Livis is the suspect's daughter! And the surviving victims are the daughter's boyfriend and the suspect's other daughter!

Woman accused of killing daughter with poisonous wine

Officials said the woman was linked to two separate murder cases that took place in 2025 and 2007.

www.foxcarolina.com

Can you imagine being one of the other dinner guests? This is really diabolical. This one is netflix worthy!

 

[azure]

A few interesting comments (and lots of stupid ones) on this North Carolina State Bureau of Investigations post. https://m.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1266395485519551&set=a.270940895065020&id=100064473351086

Can anyone confirm that Gudrun Casper-Leinenkugel is the result of a name change?

 

[lonetraveler]

I was expecting it to be ethylene glycol, so acetonitrile is a surprise.

It is not easy to get and one would likely need some kind of chemicals or analysis background to be able to order it. It is not something that a restaurant owner would be using, or be familiar with. I assume the mother, G C-L will have interesting computer search results when examined by LE.

From AI:

How does one get acetonitrile: Buy from chemical supply companies (like Sigma-Aldrich, Fisher Scientific) if you need it for lab work or specific applications, but expect hazardous material surcharges and regulations.

I'm also wondering how on earth she obtained this chemical. This is totally psycho and evil.

 

[bestill]

A few interesting comments (and lots of stupid ones) on this North Carolina State Bureau of Investigations post. https://m.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1266395485519551&set=a.270940895065020&id=100064473351086

Can anyone confirm that Gudrun Casper-Leinenkugel is the result of a name change?

From your link I did find this about the Pub that she opened in 2016. It actually looks like it was a fun concept. Have no idea how long is stayed open - Patton Public House brings European comfort food to West Asheville – Mountain Xpress

 

[Herat]

From your link I did find this about the Pub that she opened in 2016. It actually looks like it was a fun concept. Have no idea how long is stayed open - Patton Public House brings European comfort food to West Asheville – Mountain Xpress

She sounds very interesting and like a hospitable person with a fun idea. The comments after the article seem hostile and I wonder if the local style just didn’t fit well with what she wanted to do. The restaurant business can be very punishing and many an owner’s inspiration and flair gets trampled by people not wanting to support anything innovative.

I also wonder if she put so much into starting the restauraunt and is now burned out and stuck with the place 13 years later.

 

[Inthedetails]

She sounds very interesting and like a hospitable person with a fun idea. The comments after the article seem hostile and I wonder if the local style just didn’t fit well with what she wanted to do. The restaurant business can be very punishing and many an owner’s inspiration and flair gets trampled by people not wanting to support anything innovative.

I also wonder if she put so much into starting the restauraunt and is now burned out and stuck with the place 13 years later.

Welp, by the time that article was printed, she had already killed someone, apparently. She is charged with a 2007 murder, as well as the recent ones, and that article is from 2016.

jmopinion

 

[Warwick1991]

She's one of the most frightening people I've read about recently. It is so sinister for a restaurant owner to do this - slipping a difficult to detect chemical that turns to cyanide in the body - and putting it into a bottle of wine. She must have researched this very carefully, perhaps planning to kill customers as well as family members before her establishment closed.

The Thanksgiving dinner sounds like a family only event, but one has to wonder whether she also killed restaurant customers this way.... I wonder whether victim Michael Schmidt was a restaurant customer or someone in her inner circle.

And it appears that she wanted to kill both of her daughters....

Edit: According to some sources, the chemical, also known as methyl cyanide, is a clear liquid that has an ether-like odor and a sweet, but burnt taste... https://www.michigan.gov/-/media/Pr...9-05.pdf?rev=28d46581211d4fcfa7d6354706f38e38

So it would have to be in a food or drink that would disguise the odor or taste. She would have experimented with it, I assume, to find out what would disguise any off taste or smell.

It is very dangerous to touch or inhale, too

 

[bestill]

Do we know if she's currently (prior to arrest) working in food prep or serving now?