‘Desperate For A Divorce Filing’: Lawyer For California Doctor Calls Husband’s Poisoning Allegations ‘Defamatory’

The lawyer for a California dermatologist accused of poisoning her husband with drain cleaner said this week that the claims made by the husband are “defamatory.”

In an interview with CBS Los Angeles Wednesday, David Wohl, the attorney for Dr. Yue “Emily” Yu, said that while Yu was using Drano drain cleaner in the kitchen, she was not using it in an attempt to poison him. Wohl said that the allegations made by Yu’s husband, Dr. Jack Chen, are “absurd” and “defamatory,” and part of a “desparate” ploy to retain custody of their children as part of a divorce.

“The idea that my client, who is a 45-year-old well-respected dermatologist in Orange County, would destroy her life, destroy her children’s life, and try to kill her husband is just completely absurd and untrue — and for that matter defamatory,” Wohl told CBS Los Angeles.

Wohl said that the family was dealing with plumbing issues, and any time his client was pouring the drain cleaner into a cup, it was to deal with those plumbing issues, and she poured the cleaner into a cup so that it would not splash. “Any time that she poured Drano into a cup, it was completely empty,” Wohl claimed. “It was for facilitating use in the sink or any other particular part of her house that was clogged as far as the drainage goes, but she never poured any Drano or any chemical into any drink that the father or her husband used or was drinking, ever. That’s completely untrue.”

The lawyer said he did not know if Chen ingested drain cleaner, and if so, how. “But we do know that he was desperate for a divorce filing,” Wohl said. “He was desperate to have reasons to gain custody of the children. And we believe completely that these claims that he has made are all part and parcel of that effort.”

Yu was arrested by Irvine police last week after her husband brought images of Yu allegedly pouring drain cleaner into his lemonade to police, as The Daily Wire reported Tuesday. In court documents obtained by the New York Post, Chen alleged that Yu had put drain cleaner in his lemonade on at least three occasions in July. According to his lawyer, via CBS Los Angeles, Chen told police that he’d been noticing a chemical taste in his lemonade and had been sick for months.

He was diagnosed with stomach ulcers, gastritis, and inflammation of the esophagus. Suspecting his wife, Chen installed a “nanny cam” in their kitchen, court documents showed. Footage from the camera allegedly shows Yu pouring the drain cleaner into a cup, which Chen then drinks from. Chen then provide the footage to police.

“He became ill and his condition worsened over the past month and as a result of him examining his routine he grew suspicious of his wife and placed a video camera in the home they shared and discovered evidence he believes supports the fact that she was poisoning him,” Irvine police Lt. Bill Bingham told Fox News. Bingham said that police found the video footage he provided “to be compelling.”

Yu has been suspended from work, but was bailed out of jail and has not been charged as of Wednesday, CBS Los Angeles reported.