A mother suffering from acute depression drowned her 23-month-old twins in the bath following the breakdown of her marriage, a court has heard.

Samantha Ford, 38, killed her children Jake and Chloe on Boxing Day last year, a few months after her split from their father Steven Ford.

The Old Bailey heard she then tried to take her own life by driving her car into the back of a lorry at an estimated speed of 100mph.

When police managed to open the doors of her vehicle, she told them: "I've killed my babies. Please let me die.”

While she was taken to hospital, police attended the address she was renting in Castle Drive, Margate, where they found the two toddlers dead in their bedroom.

Ford denied murder but admitted two counts of manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility at a hearing in May.

In a victim impact statement, Mr Ford said he thought his children would have been "terrified, confused and that they suffered" in death.

He said: "This was the most heinous, spiteful act on two innocent children. I have no doubt [Ford] did this with the intention of taking her own life and punishing me in the process."

He added: "I know how she behaves when things don't go her way and when she doesn't get what she wants.

"It's an extreme version of her character because she couldn't get her own way - knowing how much I loved the children she knew it would be the ultimate punishment for me not going back to her."

At her sentencing hearing on Friday, the Old Bailey heard that Ford and her husband had spent the first 10 years of their marriage living in Qatar and their children were born by IVF while living there.

But the relationship turned sour after they returned to the UK in early 2018 and moved to the village of Charing in Kent, the court heard.

Ford was angry at leaving her affluent lifestyle in the Middle East, the Old Bailey heard, and was said to be trying to pressure her husband into returning to Qatar - leading to their split in November 2018.

In one message to Mr Ford, she said: "You have ripped my world apart now we are nothing but a miserable, broken family growing up in a s***hole."

Relatives said Ford's mental health declined rapidly following the separation, the court heard.

Prosecutor Tom Kark QC said: "She was very upset that the relationship had broken down and didn't like the idea of becoming a single mother."

She and the children moved to an address in Castle Drive, Margate, while Mr Ford remained in Charing.

The Old Bailey heard that her mental health declined rapidly following the separation.

She also googled terms such as "young mum kills herself" and "mum drowns her two children and then commits suicide".

Brenda Campbell QC, for Ford, said there had been 76 communications between Ford and mental health services in the weeks before the killings.

By Christmas, her family decided that her mental health was so poor that Mr Ford should take the twins and bring them back on Boxing Day, the court heard.

Ford drowned them later that evening after her parents had left the house.

Dr Muzzaffar Hussain, a consultant forensic psychiatrist treating Ford at the Trevor Gibbens Hospital in Maidstone, Kent, said her actions could be attributed to a "narcissistic rage" at her perceived humiliation at the hands of her husband.

"There's a sense of being mocked by him that played a role," he said.

Dr Hussain also described her "sense of entitlement".

He said Ford had been experiencing a "homicide/suicide fantasy", saying: "That, I think, was in play as a way of retaliation and of punishment of Mr Ford for leaving her - a sense of 'this is what you made me do'."

Mr Justice Edis is due to pass sentence on August 16 after evidence from further psychiatric witnesses.

Additional reporting by Press Association