Mom accused of killing son she tried to drown in 2008

TULARE COUNTY, Calif. – Authorities in California say they're planning to charge a 45-year-old mother with murdering her 12-year-old son. 

It's not the first time she's been accused of harming him, KFSN reported.

On Monday, the Mineral County Montana Sheriff’s Office confirmed that in 2008, Sherri Telnas was charged with trying to drown her son in a river reportedly because bad thoughts or voices told her to do it.

Telnas pleaded to two counts of criminal endangerment and was sentenced to a commitment with the state's department of public health and human services. But court documents show that by December of 2010, a Montana judge ruled Jackson should be placed in the primary care of Telnas, KFSN reported.

This weekend, 11 years later, Telnas is accused of killing that same son, Jackson, who was 12 years old. Authorities say she tried to kill her other son, Jacob Ray, 7, too.

The brothers were found in an irrigation ditch near a corn field early Saturday morning.

Jackson died at Sierra View Medical Center. Jacob Ray is being cared for at Valley Children's Hospital.

In recent months, their grandmother says Sherri Telnas took weeks to reply to her texts about a possible visit.

"We just wondered why she wasn't responding,” Dianna Keeland, the boys’ grandmother, said. “But I didn't think this was going to happen. This is just the farthest thing. None of us expected this."

About a year ago, Keeland says her son, the boys father, split with Sherri Telnas again and moved to Montana.

In December of last year, Sherri Telnas filed a request to have his visits with Jackson be at her discretion, writing, “Father has moved to Montana and has no plans to move to California, as to adhere to a schedule.”

The case was never settled, but Keeland says the boys continued to live with their mother.

Family members have created a GoFundMe account to help with funeral and medical expenses.

“They were best friends,” Keeland said of the brothers. “Jackson always took care of Jacob Ray. He was his little brother. And Jacob Ray didn't call him Jackson, he called him 'brudder.'"

Telnas is scheduled to appear in court Tuesday.