‘She wasn’t just my daughter, she was my best friend’

"EMPTY, angry, devastated’.

Those are the only words that come to Andrea Hall’s mind when asked to describe how she has felt in the months since her daughter’s murder.

Her frustrations are epitomised by the anguished plea of a four-year-old child who wants to see her elder sister.

“The younger ones don’t really understand,” says Mrs Hall. “Ellie, who is five, sat in my room and said to me, ‘Can Ashleigh come out of her box?’.

“We have her ashes in a box and she thought that Ashleigh was in there.

“I just wish it was that easy.”

Instead, Ellie will have to learn that her sister is never coming back.

Ashleigh Hall

Youngest sister Evie, who is not even two, is too young to remember Ashleigh and will have to rely on the photographs that adorn the family home in Darlington to learn more.

The photos and the stories.

As Mrs Hall sits at home with her father, Mike, they share tales of the fun-loving girl who was taken away from them.

“Everyone who knew Ashleigh said she was a happy fun-loving girl,”

remembers Mrs Hall.

“She was so caring and was the life and of wherever she went.

“There’s nothing anyone can say bad about her.”

But for now, the laughter that would ordinarily accompany the stories, seem a long way off.

‘EMPTY’

FOR the past 17 years, Mrs Hall and Ashleigh were more like sisters than mother and daughter.

The Darlington College childcare student helped Mrs Hall, a single mother, bring up her three sisters.

Now the house is quiet without the noisy teenager.

“Being on my own is the worst,” says Mrs Hall. “When the kids have gone to bed, that’s the worst.

“I would have had Ashleigh to talk to then.

“It was always just me and Ashleigh.

“I still don’t sleep now properly. I’m still waiting for her to come home.”

The hollowness left by Ashleigh’s murder has only been filled by the help Mrs Hall has received from friends, family and the local community.

A fact that she is quick to recognise.

“I’ve found strength through my kids and my family and close friends.

“If I didn’t, I don’t think there would be a reason to carry on.”

‘ANGRY’

PETER CHAPMAN, the man who killed Ashleigh, the man who robbed the Hall family of a daughter, sister, niece and granddaughter, was the also man who changed his plea at the last minute to guilty.

Mrs Hall says she was constantly reminded of the moment, which she, unsurprisingly, acknowledges as the worst moment of her life.

She says: “You think your daughter’s going to live a full life.

“I already knew that something was wrong. I’d been trying to ring her and when she wasn’t answering her phone I knew something was wrong.

“Then the police arrived and said that they’d arrested a man on a driving offence.

“I knew something was wrong. Ashleigh would have been in touch.

“When police came to the door, I just knew.”

It is tempting to hit out, to blame everybody for the tragedy. The internet sites, the justice system, the police, the education system.

But for Mrs Hall, only one person is to blame for taking away one of the most precious things in her life.

“You can’t blame Facebook and social networking,” she says. “It was a horrible paedophile hiding behind the photograph of a goodlooking 19-year-old boy.

“Of course Ashleigh’s going to want to meet up with him. She just didn’t have a clue who he was.

“She got a message saying, ‘my Dad’s coming to pick you up’.

“She got in the car thinking it was this boy’s Dad and then God knows what happened.

“She must have been terrified.”

It is a cliche, but Mrs Hall knows that no sentence is going to be punishment enough for the death of her daughter. “He’s still got his life in prison,” she says.

“He’s going to have a nice life. If he’s out in 20 years, I’ll still only be 60.”

‘DEVASTATED’

NOW the court case is finished and the media spotlight will focus on another family’s tragedy, it would be easy to hope that life will return to normal for the Halls.

But for Mrs Hall and her daughters, nothing will be the same again.

The emptiness, the anger will always remain.

She says: “Everyone else’s life is moving on, understandably. They’ve got their own children and families. My life will never move on.

“I will be starting to get my life back on track, but you can’t. She was my first born. We were on our own for the first 11 years.

“She wasn’t just my daughter, she was my best friend.”

Already, as Mrs Hall’s family try to rebuild the effect that it has had on the family is evident.

The childhood innocence of her three other daughters has also been taken away.

For them, the world is no longer a playground, but a place where evil lurks behind every corner and every computer screen.

“Olivia’s the eldest and she’s just heartbroken,” says Mrs Hall. “She won’t be allowed out, but in fact, she doesn’t want to go out.

“She said that she doesn’t want to get killed like Ashleigh.

“They don’t really go on the computer.

“They have to go on for school, but they don’t go on social networking sites.”

These thoughts are echoed by Mike Hall, Ashleigh’s grandfather.

He expresses his anger that Peter Chapman was ever allowed to leave prison to kill his granddaughter in the first place.

“The thing is, we’re the victim, but we’re the ones punished,” he says. “We’re going to be punished for the rest of our lives.”

Now, all the family has is each other.

“This has brought us closer together. I’m a single mum, there’s just me and my kids,” says Andrea. “I can try to get on with life.

“I’m just going to concentrate on the three little ones. I’ve just got to try to make their lives as easy as possible.

“The world that we live in is going to get worse. You’ve got to be vigilant and make sure your kids are safe.

“If kids are going on the internet, make sure you set parental controls.”