Just a normal teenager

To her family, she was a noisy 17-year-old who played her music loudly and left her clothes on her bedroom floor.

To her friends, she was a popular, bubbly girl constantly on the phone, who loved her course working with children at Darlington College.

All agree that they want Ashleigh to be remembered for who she was and not for the heinous crimes committed against her.

The hundreds of people and the massive outpouring of emotion at her funeral were testament to the high regard in which the outgoing teen was held by her peers.

Ashleigh attended Hurworth School, where staff described her as the nicest person in the world, who constantly had a smile on her face.

When she left school, she went to Darlington College where she began a diploma in childcare.

Ashleigh’s experience helping her mother, Andrea, to bring up her three younger sisters, Olivia, six, Ellie, four, and Evie, one, instilled a deep love of children.

It was Ashleigh’s ambition to be a nursery nurse when she graduated from college.

Her family have little doubt she would have excelled in this career.

Mrs Hall said: “Ashleigh was my rock.

“We were on our own for 11 years because I had my three other daughters late.

“She helped me constantly with the others. She babysat, ironed, and changed nappies.

She did everything I asked her to do.

“She fed, washed and bathed them because she had a loving nature.”

The friendship with Andrea transcended that of a mother and daughter.

As well as being like a second parent to her sisters, Ashleigh became like a sibling and confidante to her mother.

The pair trusted each other, and it was because of this, that when, on that fateful night, Ashleigh failed to return her mother’s calls, Andrea knew immediately something was wrong.

Ashleigh had never shown that much interest in boys, her mother said.

A previous relationship had only lasted a few days.

Mrs Hall said: “She wasn’t that bothered about boys, although she would tell me if she fancied a particular lad.

“I knew exactly where she was most of the time.

“She would never slip off with telling me.

“Ashleigh wasn’t a bad kid.

She wasn’t naughty. She made one mistake and paid for it with her life.”

With Ashleigh gone, life for the Hall family is much quieter.

Her grandfather, Mike, a gardener, smiles fondly as he remembers the little girl who used to beg to accompany him to work.

He said: “She used to love it, especially if there was a cafe.

“We always used to have a bacon sandwich.

“I used to garden at a place near Gilling West, in North Yorkshire, and she would bring a packed lunch box and sit there and eat it all and then ask if we were going to a cafe.”

Ashleigh’s popularity was evident by the way in which the community responded to help the Hall family.

On the night the police called to say that a body had been found, it seemed as if the whole neighbourhood came out to comfort Andrea and her daughters.

Then, shortly after her death, the community paid tribute by planting spring bulbs close to her home in Branksome.

Ashleigh’s grandfather recalled: “We turned up to it and there were only about three people there and my heart sank.

“We started planting the bulbs and then all of a sudden cars started parking up, people started coming over.

“We planted the bulbs in Ashleigh’s initials and we had some spare, so someone suggested that we plant them outside Ashleigh’s house.

“Everybody walked up there, we planted them and then I asked if we could have a moment’s silence. It did us all a world of good.”

It is the happy memories of Ashleigh that have kept the family going through the darkest periods.

The teasing of her grandfather when he used to play his Mark Knopfler CDs.

The loud music blasting from her bedroom.

The dressing up at Halloween with her sisters.

The constant use of her mobile phone, so much so that a large floral tribute of a mobile phone featured prominently at her funeral.

Her love of the colour pink which dominated her bedroom.

It is these things that the family want to remember.

Not a murder statistic or a newspaper headline.

Just a normal teenage girl.