The 20-year-old's body was recovered from the water in Kensington Gardens on Tuesday, the same day William Kenealy, 25, was convicted at the Old Bailey of the rape of her mother and young sister.

The body is thought to have been in the pond for up to two weeks.

The woman told the Daily Mail: "I cannot believe my daughter has died. I try not to feel sorry for myself, but I wonder why all this tragedy has come our way."

She said her older daughter had been haunted by guilt after the rapes and had turned to drink.

"I think her dying in that way is the result of all this evil. She probably fell in the water while she was drunk. The poor thing always felt she was somehow to blame."

'Perverted tendencies'

Kenealy, from Northolt, north-west London, was given five life sentences at the Old Bailey on Thursday for the "terrifying" rapes of the woman and her young daughter on Boxing Day 1996, and a teenage schoolgirl 10 months later.

The woman found out about her daughter's death just hours after Kenealy's conviction.

Judge Ian Davies told Kenealy: "I am satisfied your conduct has manifestly perverted tendencies and while at large you will remain a danger to women for an indefinite time."

A year after the rapes, the nine-year-old's statement to the police was released to the media in an appeal for information to catch the rapist.

She described having "a lovely time on Christmas Day". "I had some nice presents. I got a Spice Girls' tape and we had a big Christmas dinner. I was allowed to stay up and I went to bed quite late," she said.

"A little while after - I woke up and saw a man in my bedroom. My mum was in the same room as me and I saw that a man was holding a knife up to my Mum's face.

Stole Christmas money

"I was so frightened, I couldn't move or scream or do anything. I thought he was going to cut my mum or hurt her in some way.

"I just couldn't call out for help or do anything to protect my Mum. I was so scared that I just kept very still."

"The man still had the knife and I was frightened that he was going to kill me or my mum. I just wanted him to go away. He made me get him some money and took my mum's purse.

"He also took some money that I had been given for Christmas. Then he went."

The little girl said that afterwards she was frightened to sleep in her bedroom on her own for a long time. She had not looked forward to last Christmas as it brought back memories.

The dead woman cannot be named by the BBC because it would, in turn, identify the rape victims.