A distraught mother told last night how she watched in horror as her estranged husband shot their seven-year-old daughter dead.

Lyndsey Shipstone, 42, spoke for the first time about her terror as Egyptian-born Yasser Alromisse carried out the cold-blooded killing as revenge for her turning her back on Islam.

Alromisse, 46, shot their daughter Mary in the head on the doorstep of her home as she returned from primary school on September 11.

‘It was just an ordinary day. Mary had come home from school. She was holding her violin,’ Miss Shipstone said. ‘We walked to the house. There was nothing extraordinary. We’d just picked up one of the local cats that waited for her.

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Harrowing: Lyndsey Shipstone has desribed the moment her daughter Mary was shot in the head by estranged partner Yasser Alromisse as the pair returned home from school

‘It waited for her every day when she came home from school. We were holding her and just walking down the path and were going to give her some food, like we did every day. As soon as I put the front door key in there was a terrible bang behind me. I turned round – and Mary was on the ground.’

Alromisse shot the girl again before fleeing to his car.

‘I saw her father with the gun in his hand pointing at Mary’s head and he fired a second time, and then he retreated into the car and I just dropped down to Mary and dragged her round the front of the house away from the car,’ Miss Shipstone said.

‘I was screaming for help and I was telling neighbours who were calling the police that he had a gun and Mary had been shot. I realised I had to get her away.’

Joy: This photo shows Mary's delight as she unwrapped her Christmas presents

She tried desperately to save her daughter but despite her efforts, Mary – who would have been eight last week – died the following day at King’s College Hospital in London.

By the time police arrived, Alromisse had turned the gun on himself in his car, which he had parked in a driveway beside the three-bedroom house. Miss Shipstone had spent years hiding from Alromisse and had apparently begged lawyers not to tell him that she and Mary were living in the quiet village of Northiam, East Sussex.

Authorities face serious questions over how he found out where they were. Miss Shipstone married Alromisse, a council community safety officer, in Liverpool in 2005 after converting to Islam, friends said. But she rejected his faith and left with Mary and her son Stephen, 21, from a previous relationship.

Miss Shipstone had recently started seeing a new partner and apparently planned legal action over the custody of Mary. But she could not understand why Alromisse would kill their child.

The couple’s bitter custody battle ended in tragedy last week when Alromisse shot his daughter in the head outside her mother’s house before killing himself

Ms Shipstone said she could not fathom Alromisse's motivation and was 'taking each day as it comes'

She agreed for Mary’s organs to be donated, which has saved five other children, including two babies. She said: ‘It was important to allow Mary to make that gift of her organs because she was such a healthy girl.

‘I thought it would be a way of Mary living on in these children in some small way.’

A memorial fund has been set up for Mary, whom Miss Shipstone described as lively and intelligent. She said she took ‘great comfort’ in having been with her daughter during her final moments, but added: ‘You can’t describe the horror that I’ve felt losing my precious daughter.

‘I’d hoped that she would survive. But it wasn’t to be.’

Special day: Mary on her baptism day in 2013 (left). Her organs have been donated to five other children

Mary was left in a life-threatening condition following the shooting and the youngster, who lived with Ms Shipstone and her brother, died from her injuries the following day