ARAPAHOE COUNTY, Colo. — Outgoing. Dynamic. Generous. Kind. Loving. Sarcastic.
Those are just a few words that can be used to describe Angela Craig.
"How do you describe that person in a word or two? It's Angela. You can't," her older brother, Mark Pray, told Denver7 in an exclusive interview Thursday. "She's funny. She doesn't take things personally. She has a thick skin. She's just like most of the rest of us, but Angie's also herself."
Angela Craig was a mother to six children, and the youngest of 10 siblings.
"She's crazy. She's just loud, and then sometimes not loud, and she likes to take charge. She likes to coordinate. She likes to keep things moving in the right direction. She's not scared to speak up, but at the same time, so compromising," Pray said. "Angela was special. I'm sure everybody thinks there's special people in their life, and they are special people, but Angela was special. She touched a lot of people."
Angela Craig was 43 years old when her life was cut short. For more than two years, her family has waited on justice.
That justice was handed down inside an Arapahoe County courtroom on Wednesday. James Craig, Angela Craig's husband, was convicted by a jury of first-degree murder, along with two counts of solicitation to commit tampering with physical evidence, two counts of solicitation to commit perjury in the first degree, and one count of solicitation to commit first-degree murder.
"I wouldn't even call it bittersweet. It's just relieving. It's a relief," Pray said about the guilty verdict. "This has been hanging over our heads for two-and-a-half years, wondering – I mean, knowing that he's guilty, but wondering how it's all going to work out is difficult."
Pray, who lives in Utah, commuted to Colorado for several of James Craig's court appearances over the years.
"I was here quite a bit, and it's just always part of your life," Pray said about the court process. "And Jim is always part of your life, and now he doesn't have to be part of our life anymore."
Despite the mountain of evidence prosecutors had on their side in the case, Pray was still anxious as he walked inside the courtroom before the verdict was read.
"We know he's guilty. We've been involved in the process, you know, since the beginning, but they [jurors] don't know anything," Pray explained. "And they don't know him, and they don't know us, and they don't know what happened, and you don't know how people could get influenced."
Prosecutors have argued James Craig poisoned his wife over a 10-day period via workout smoothies and a medication intended to treat a sinus infection. They also claim he administered a lethal dose of cyanide to Angela Craig while she was hospitalized on March 15, 2023.
Her cause of death was determined to be lethal doses of cyanide and tetrahydrozoline, a decongestant found in over-the-counter eyedrops. She also suffered through several bouts of sickness before her passing, and doctors struggled to determine why she was ill.
Pray came into town to help the Craigs when Angela Craig was growing increasingly ill in 2023. On the morning of March 15, James Craig asked the Prays to administer a dose of Clindamycin to Angela Craig.
James Craig had prescribed the Clindamycin to Angela Craig. It's an antibiotic that was intended to treat a sinus infection. However, prosecutors claim he filled the capsules of Clindamycin with cyanide.
During emotional testimony in the trial, Pray explained how he gave his sister what he believed to be medication.
"You know, we trusted Jim," Pray said, looking off into the distance. "As a big brother, you want to be — you are protective. I'm that way with my own family, and that's how it should be. But I didn't know anything was going on, and so we still trusted him, and he used me in that process."
Not long after Pray gave his sister the pills, she was struggling to hold herself up, and they rushed her to the hospital.
"You just wish you would have known," Pray said. "You don't know what you don't know. And so we were there, and he killed her right under my nose."
Still, somehow, Pray does not have any lingering feelings toward James Craig. Instead, he feels nothing at all for him.
"I don't hate Jim. Because if I hate him, that's my problem, right? Jim's just out of the picture. He doesn't matter," Pray said. "Jim's not part of this anymore. So we just, we're just going to forget about Jim."
Defense attorneys for James Craig argued Angela Craig was suicidal at the time of her death, and that he assisted her in ending her life. Not one of the witnesses called to the stand testified that Angela would have taken her life. Her family insisted she had too much to live for — specifically, her six children.
"She was a mom first," Pray said with a laugh. "She was deeply involved in all of her kids' lives — spiritually, emotionally — just completely supportive of things they wanted to do, but also guiding them to do the right things."
Just before James Craig was sentenced, Judge Shay Whitaker commended the Pray family for somehow maintaining humor and light within the courtroom.
"It was, yeah, challenging to do, but we've had practice," Pray replied, when asked how the family kept their composure during the trial. "We help each other. Just being together adds some strength to us. You know, we tease, we joke about it. Maybe some people think you shouldn't, but that's how we deal with grief."
Pray said the family are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and their faith has been instrumental during this incredibly difficult time.
"Families aren't just for this life, but for the next, and so she's still part of our family, and she's still Angela. I know that she's still there, and we'll see her again," Pray said, smiling.
Now, as the family leaves the trial behind, Pray said they will continue to put their lives back together.
"We will probably do a memorial, a tribute to her. And when this first happened, we had a family reunion, you know, all around Angela. And we'll continue to do things like that to keep her in our memory," he said. "We go home and we raise kids and we go to work and life continues."
Pray told Denver7 there is nothing he would like to say to his sister that she doesn't already know.
"She knows we love her."
