Police are investigating the case of a 40-year-old Portuguese woman who is believed to have killed her two children before killing herself on Tuesday afternoon in Viseu, northern Portugal.
Maria Helena, the mother of two children, Filipe, aged eight and Maria João aged 11, was being treated for depression and had been off work for around four months due to her illness.
On Tuesday afternoon, a family member alerted her husband, Fernando Costa Gomes, a local GNR sergeant, that Maria Helena was not answering the door. When he arrived home he found the three bodies in the couple’s bedroom.
A family member told Portuguese news agency Lusa: “The couple had a very harmonious relationship. They were very united and very religious, they went to church every Sunday.”
Maria Graça Ferreira, a friend of Maria Helena, said: “Lately she said that life didn’t make sense anymore and one day she would do something crazy. But she loved her children and did all she could to make them happy.”
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