London Evening Standard/London

A woman was being questioned by police yesterday over the deaths of her three severely disabled children at their home in south London.
The children, twin boys aged three and a four-year-old girl, were found dead at the £1.2mn home in New Malden. Their parents were named locally as Tania Clarence and City banker Gary who also have an older healthy daughter.
Tania Clarence, 43, a graphic designer, was arrested when officers were called to her five-bedroom home in Thetford Road after an emergency call at around 9.30 on Tuesday night.
Police said she had suffered minor injuries and was taken to hospital but was later discharged and arrested on suspicion of murder. Her husband, also 43, is a senior executive at the City bank group Investec.
He is not thought to have been at home at the time.
There were reports that the eldest daughter, aged seven, who attends a private school in Wimbledon, was on holiday in South Africa with Gary Clarence. They were said to be on a flight back yesterday.
Shocked friends and neighbours described them as a “lovely, respectable middle class family” who had moved to their home two years ago.
The couple, both from South Africa, are said to have spent thousands of pounds refurbishing the Victorian house to make it open plan to accommodate wheelchairs for their disabled children.
The younger children were described by friends as suffering from a muscular dystrophy disease called spinal muscular atrophy. The couple had a healthy elder daughter but when their second child Olivia was two years old they began noticing she had developmental problems, friends said.
At the time Tania was pregnant with twin boys. After a series of tests doctors established the parents were carriers for the disease and that their daughter Olivia may not live to be a teenager. A friend said: “The twins could not function at all. They had no muscle strength whatsoever. It was so devastating. They realised their daughter was not developing properly and then discovered this awful genetic condition.
“Her life was just so difficult. Always having different carers in and out of the house, transforming everything to make it accessible for wheelchairs. It was just so much to cope with.”
Joy Devis, 86, who saw the family two days ago, said: “One of the children never got out of the wheelchair and the other two have difficulty in walking. They always seemed very happy and were delightful neighbours. Because they are so busy they had a full-time nanny and a maid for when the mother goes to work.
“I used to see them playing in the garden. They were a delightful family and it’s a terrible shock. They seemed perfectly happy.”
One neighbour said: “I was at a barbecue with them two weeks ago. They were there with one if their daughters. “They seemed very happy and were laughing and joking. He was talking about golf and has been on a recent trip to the US. They seemed like a happy family this is a total shock.”