Olathe mom in custody battle jailed after alleged attempted murder of her 3 children

An Olathe woman involved in a long-standing child custody dispute with her former husband is jailed after the alleged attempted murder of her three children Monday night.

Olathe police said the children had “ingested a substance meant to harm them,” according to a press release.

The woman, identified in jail records as 37-year-old Therese Roever, also had ingested the substance, police said. She and the three children were all taken to hospitals in serious condition.

She was later released from the hospital and booked into the Johnson County Jail.

Roever and her former husband were scheduled to appear in court Tuesday as part of ongoing litigation concerning child custody issues, court records show.

That hearing was canceled, but an attorney for Roever’s former husband filed a request Tuesday for an “emergency review hearing” on the custody case.

“This motion is based on the fact that petitioner (Roever) has been arrested and booked on three counts of attempted capital murder with the children as victims,” Attorney Randy McCalla wrote in the motion.

McCalla declined further comment.

Olathe Police said that officers responding to a 911 call in the 1700 block of North Lennox Street on Monday night found a woman and three children inside a residence “requiring medical attention.”

According to the police press release, police thought they had ingested the substance based on what the woman told them.

Roever was listed Tuesday as in the custody of the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office, according to jail records. She has not been charged.

According to Johnson County District Court records, the three children are girl and boy twins born in 2010 and a son born in 2012.

Her former husband had primary residential custody of the children after the couple was divorced in 2016, according to court records.

Roever has made previously made several allegations of abusive behavior against her husband, and the most recent public posting on her Facebook page featured a Stop Domestic Violence message.

But according to court documents filed by an attorney representing the interests of the children, police and state officials found no basis to support the allegations.

Last June, a judge ruled that Roever had been making “fake reports regarding the children,” and as a result, the judge ordered that her visitation with the children had to be supervised by a third party.

But in November, that order was modified to allow her to have unsupervised visitation at designated times, according to the court records.

Olathe police said they are continuing to investigate and ask anyone with information to call the Olathe Police Department at 913-971-7500 or the TIPS Hotline at 816-474-8477.

This story was originally published February 20, 2018 at 8:15 AM with the headline "Olathe mom in custody battle jailed after alleged attempted murder of her 3 children."