A four-year-old girl was murdered by her mother and her boyfriend who had subjected her to "sustained, deliberate and brutal" violence, a court heard.

Little Leticia Aalayah Wright had been burned, bitten and beaten in the days before her death last November, it was alleged.

Bradford Crown Court was told yesterday that a severe wound to the back of her head and an abdominal injury similar to those suffered in road traffic accidents had led to the youngster's death.

Her mother Sharon Wright, 23, of Almondbury Bank, Moldgreen, Huddersfield, and her then boyfriend Peter Seaton, 22, of Meadow Lane, Northallerton, have denied her murder.

* Read the full story in The Northern Echo tomorrow.