An Orange County doctor accused of poisoning her husband with Drano now faces allegations in his upcoming divorce proceedings and in a criminal case that he tried to coach his children to lie about their father.
Yue “Emily” Yu was accused in 2022 of poisoning her husband, Jack Chen, who filed for divorce and is seeking custody of their two children. The next court date for the divorce proceedings is April 30, while the criminal case is expected to return to court at the end of May.
Yu lost in-person visitation rights with their children late last year, after her daughter told a school therapist that she was afraid her mother would also poison her and that Yu had coached her to say she wanted to be with her mother “24-7,” according to a recently released statement from the therapist.
The girl “seemed upset and looked tearful as she explained that she felt conflicted about lying because if she didn’t ‘she would make her mother angry.’ I asked her why she was so afraid of making her mother angry. (She) replied, “Because what if she did to me what she did to my father?” “, according to the press release.
“Are you afraid your mother will kill you?” asked the therapist.
The girl, whom the Times is not naming because she is an alleged victim of child abuse, responded “Yes,” according to the affidavit.
The court documents were reported Monday by the Daily Mail.
The records are part of the divorce and domestic violence proceedings between Yu and Chen, both doctors in Irvine.
Chen became suspicious when he began suffering from stomach ulcers and a swollen esophagus, and noticed a “chemical taste” in his hot morning lemonade. Yu was arrested and charged with three counts of poisoning and one count of corporal injury to a spouse and released on $30,000 bail.
While Chen had previously accused Yu in court documents of physically abusing their children, the conversation with the therapist was the first time either child had directly accused their mother of abuse.
The 10-year-old girl said her mother beat her with the leg of a chair and her maternal grandmother did the same, chasing the children around the house to hit them with it, according to therapist Patricia Ramsey’s statement. .
Yu also coached the children, telling them to lie about why the family had Drano in the house. She asked them to say it was because there was an ant infestation and that Chen had refused to get ant traps, according to the statement.
The coaching took place during scheduled visits with instructors, but Yu took steps to instruct the children when the instructors were not paying attention, according to the therapist’s statement.
These allegations led the judge in the case to suspend Yu’s ability to meet his children in person.
Yu’s lawyers argued that the allegations were fabricated and that the children enjoyed the time they spent with Yu.
“The fact that the children are enjoying their parenting time with their mother, and even wishing they had more time, is completely at odds with the father’s current allegations of impropriety,” Yu’s attorney, Danielle Struwe, wrote in court documents.
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