He proceeded to cremate her body three days after the incident—and eventually collected approximately $5 million in life insurance, according to the feds
By 2016, the couple had made multiple trips to Zambia, including their final excursion between September and October of that year, where the affidavit states “Bianca Rudolph’s goal… was to kill a leopard.”
Police also interviewed the couple’s “professional hunting guide,” who said that he was “completing paperwork related to the hunt in the camp’s dining area” when Bianca was shot. When he arrived at the couple’s cabin, he told police, he saw Rudolph shouting for help while his wife was on the floor. A Zambian game scout, who had been escorting the Rudolphs during their hunt, told police a similar story—noting he saw the shotgun lying near the door.
The consular chief also noted that Bianca had a second injury to the chest caused by “wadding” from a shotgun cartridge, causing him to believe that the distance between the muzzle of the gun and her chest was between 6.5 and 8 feet. Prosecutors, however, state that this analysis seemingly contradicted the local police’s conclusion and Rudolph's story.
But while Rudolph received almost $5 million in his wife’s insurance policies, the FBI was quickly brought in to investigate the case after receiving a call from one of Bianca’s friends on Oct. 27, 2016. The affidavit states that the friend “suspected foul play because Lawrence Rudolph had been involved in prior extramarital affairs and had been having an affair at the time of Bianca’s death.”
“Larry is never going to divorce her because he doesn’t want to lose his money, and she’s never going to divorce him because of her Catholicism,” the friend told investigators, according to the affidavit.