Scottish mum charged over deaths

EDINBURGH - The American mother of three children who were found dead in an Edinburgh house faces criminal charges, police said.

Authorities issued an arrest warrant against Theresa Riggi, 46, as police completed autopsies on her children 8-year-old twins Augustino and Gianluca and sister Cecilia, 5.

The children were discovered after a gas explosion at a house in Edinburgh but are not thought to have died as a result of the blast. Riggi is in serious but stable condition after apparently falling from an upper storey of a house in Edinburgh.

Riggi and her husband, US oil industry executive Pasquale Riggi of Colorado, were contesting the custody of their children. Scottish authorities said the couple had been due to attend court hearings this week.

Police have interviewed the children's father but confirmed he is not a suspect. They said the autopsies on the children were completed yesterday but no details were disclosed. Pasquale Riggi described his difficulties in coming to terms with the children's deaths.

"Our family is struggling to come to terms with the immense and tragic loss of three beautiful children," he said.

His wife and the children were reported missing from the family's home in Aberdeen, about 160km north of Edinburgh, on July 21.

Pasquale Riggi is an executive with Royal Dutch Shell in Scotland.

- AP