A WOMAN described as a good mother to her seven children is being investigated after three of the youngest died when she drove a car into a lake.
AKON Guode, 35, was questioned by homicide detectives on Thursday and later released without charge.
On Wednesday afternoon, she was at the wheel of a 4WD that ploughed deep into a suburban Melbourne lake with four of her children on board.Three died and a fourth was seriously injured.Police say their investigation into the tragic incident was ongoing though Ms Guode has been released from custody."She has been interviewed and allowed to leave without being charged," a Victoria Police spokeswoman told AAP late on Thursday."The investigation is continuing."One-year-old Bol, his four-year-old sister Anger and her twin brother Maudit all died after being pulled from Lake Gladman in Wyndham Vale.Their five-year-old sister, Awel, was awake but still in serious condition in the Royal Children's Hospital on Thursday.Superintendent Stuart Bateson urged the Sudanese community to help police understand what happened, as officers took a computer and other items from Ms Guode's house."We need to understand their movements yesterday leading up to the incident," Supt Bateson said."We understand that there may be some social, cultural and religious implications impacting on the community, but let me reassure you that we will remain respectful of those issues at all times."Carloads of Sudanese well-wishers also visited Ms Guode's Wyndham Vale home, as did the distraught adoptive father of the four children, Joseph Manyang, who paced up and down on the front lawn.Family also visited a makeshift memorial where people from the area had been laying flowers, toys and candles in memory of the children.Community members said Ms Guode came to Australia as a refugee after her first husband died in south Sudan.They described her as a good mother who would do anything for her children.Martha Mayola, whose children walked to school with the twins, said Ms Guode and her children had escaped the civil war in Sudan."Our community here may be weak," she told reporters."We need to be stronger so we can see someone with problems and help them."Thomas Kok, a cousin of the children's father, saw the flowers at the lake."We feel like people care, it's nice," Mr Kok told reporters on Thursday."It's shocked everyone."Police have removed the car from the water, its tyres covered in thick mud.The Major Collisions Unit will examine the vehicle as part of investigations to find out whether the fatal smash was an accident or not.
