A NSW mother who has been accused of trying to drown her two children in the Murray River has told her lawyer she would never hurt her children.
The woman’s lawyer, Peter Hebbard, told reporters outside the Deniliquin Local Court yesterday that she was “traumatised and upset”.
“She said I don’t know what happened, she said I would never hurt my children,” Mr Hebbard said according to Nine News.
“She knows that something’s happened and she knows she did something.”
The 27-year-old has been charged with murder and attempted murder after she allegedly took her two sons, aged 5 and 9, to the river on Thursday evening and tried to hold both boys underwater, reports News Corp.
The 5-year-old drowned as the scene, his body recovered on Saturday, while the 9-year-old, who managed to wriggle free, remains in a stable condition in the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne with his grandmother by his side.
“She was crying and she wanted to know how the little fellow was going down in Melbourne and I told her to the best of my knowledge he was okay, that her mother was down there with him and she seemed happy about that,” Mr Hebbard added.
A psychiatric evaluation of the mother has been ordered and she is due back in court on May 2.
The boys grandmother, who is believed to have been looking after the boys for the last 18 months, has accused the NSW government agencies of failing “miserably”.
The grandmother reportedly had an AVO out against her daughter, who had been released from prison last month, which prevented her from approaching the grandmother’s home “within 24 hours of consuming intoxicating liquor or illicit drugs”,
according to Corrective Services.
“It did not prevent the mother from living with the grandmother,” Corrective Services said in a statement, reports News Corp.
“Arrangements have been made for the offender to receive mental health and substance abuse counselling since her release from custody.
“It appears our staff took reasonable steps to put appropriate services in place and to make alternative accommodation arrangements.
“We could not have foreseen this shocking outcome.”
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian has called for a thorough investigation into what she described as “a human tragedy of the highest proportion”.
