Two teenage girls who beat to death a vulnerable woman in a 'gratuitous' attack in her own living room stifled yawns as they were jailed for 15 years.

The girls were just 13 and 14 when they spent nine hours battering frail Angela Wrightson with her few meagre possessions, including a television set, a shovel and a coffee table.

The judge described how the girls had mentally and physically tortured their victim before leaving her home in Hartlepool, County Durham, 'without knowing or caring whether she was alive or dead'.

The girls, now both 15, were yesterday handed life sentences but must only serve a minimum of 15 years - meaning they could be freed before they are 30.

Mr Justice Globe also refused an application by the Press to name the killers, saying the older girl had attempted suicide on a number of occasions over the course of the trial, including on court premises.

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Protected: A court sketch of the girls, whose identities cannot be revealed. The girls, now both 15, were handed life sentences but must only serve a minimum of 15 years - meaning they could be freed before they are 30

Vulnerable: Angela Wrightson, 39, who suffered more than 100 injuries in the attack in her Hartlepool home

Grim: This selfie was taken during the assault and showed the two girls smiling in the foreground and a blurred Ms Wrightson sitting on a sofa in the background (above). It was shared by the younger girl on Snapchat

During the trial one of the girls played with her hair and yawned repeatedly as the other stared straight ahead and chewed on her finger nails.

Miss Wrightson, who was 5ft 4ins and weighed six-and-a-half stone, was found dead in the blood-spattered front room of her terraced home just 17 days before Christmas in 2014.

Despite the 39-year-old begging for her life, the pair stopped the assault only to pose for pictures which the younger girl sent to friends on social network Snapchat, with the caption 'nah xx'.

They were later caught on CCTV after leaving Miss Wrightson's home at around 11pm and returning following a 'break' at 2am to finish the bloody job, and even called police to give them a lift home when again they took a picture and shared it on Snapchat.

The girls sobbed uncontrollably as they were convicted of murder on Tuesday but remained emotionless as they were sentenced yesterday.

Addressing the girls, Mr Justice Globe said: 'This is not a case of instantaneous death following a shot, a stab or a blow, she pleaded for you stop.

'This was a sustained attack over a long period of time carried out with weapons in many different ways, she suffered mentally and physically before she lost consciousness and died.

'Her alcoholic state may have numbed the pain but it certainly won’t have taken it away, this is a highly significant aggravating factor.

'She must have despaired at being unable to escape you in the confines of her living room this was in her own living room.

'She kindly invited you in she kindly bought you what you wanted and let you stay. You abused her hospitality and attacked her again and again.'

Vicious: The girls spent hours battering Miss Wrightson with her own possessions, including a TV set (pictured)

'Gratuitous degradation': The judge said the girls had emotionally and physically tortured Miss Wrighton. Pictured, the bloody shovel that was used by the killers as a weapon during the brutal attack at her home

Violent: An 18-inch wooden stick, which had two metal screws poking out the ends, was also used

Mr Justice Globe said that the pair had faced a minimum sentence of 12 years because of their age, but that this had been extended due to the suffering they inflicted on their victim.

He added they would have faced much longer sentences if they were adults.

Describing Miss Wrightson's suffering, the judge said she suffered 70 separate slash wounds and 54 separate blunt force injuries, adding that some indicated she had tried to fight back.

'SHE KINDLY INVITED YOU IN AND YOU ATTACKED HER AGAIN AND AGAIN': JUDGE'S DAMNING WORDS FOR TWO TEENAGE KILLERS 'You were aware Angie was particularly vulnerable because of her circumstances. 'This is not a case of instantaneous death following a shot, a stab or a blow, she pleaded for you stop, this was a sustained attack over a long period of time carried out with weapons in many different ways, she suffered mentally and physically before she lost consciousness and died. 'Her alcoholic state may have numbed the pain but it certainly won’t have taken it away, this is a highly significant aggravating factor. 'She must have despaired at being unable to escape you in the confines of her living room this was in her own living room. She kindly invited you in she kindly bought you what you wanted and let you stay. 'You abused her hospitality and attacked her again and again.' Advertisement

He said: 'In addition to punching, kicking and stamping, an absolute minimum of 27 blows were struck with 14 different items', including a table, a television and a printer.

'It was an attack that included gratuitous degradation,' he added.

Miss Wrightson's mother, Maureen, sobbed in the public gallery as the judge summarised parts of her witness impact statement.

He told the court: 'She describes the horror of seeing Angie's battered body in the mortuary. She does not think she will ever be able to blink those images away.

'She cannot understand how you could have been as violent as you were. She is not alone in that view. She had been disgusted by the laughing and giggling and sharing of photographs during the time of and immediately after the attack.'

SOCIAL WORKERS PUSHED FOR FERAL TEENS' NAMES TO BE KEPT SECRET The identities of Angela Wrightson’s murderers cannot be revealed because of the efforts of those whose failings left them free to kill. Hartlepool Council and Cleveland Police, both facing criticism in a review of the murder, energetically lobbied the trial judge at public expense to keep the teenagers’ names and photographs out of the media. But their appetite for secrecy appears to make little sense when few in the tight-knit Hartlepool community are unaware of their names. And the decision flies in the face of other cases where the identities of child killers have been revealed. Foremost among those are Robert Thompson and Jon Venables, who were both ten when they murdered two-year-old James Bulger in February 1993. When they became the youngest child killers to be jailed in the 20th century, the judge allowed their identification ‘because the public interest overrode the interest of the defendants’. Yesterday, Mr Justice Globe ruled that the two 15-year-old girls should not be named publicly until they turn 18. He said one was a suicide risk, and both should be treated equally. The judge was canvassed by a QC employed by Hartlepool Council, who referred to their right to privacy under European legislation. And a senior Cleveland detective said there were ‘no obvious benefits’ in disclosing their names. It can also now be revealed that the authorities wanted the entire trial to be held in secret – a move overturned only after newspapers objected. Advertisement

However the judge refused to lift an anonymity order preventing the identification of the pair, saying that the older one had tried to kill herself on a number of occasions over the course of the trial.

He said some of these attempts happened on court premises and that on one occasion, a court official had saved her life.

Addressing the older girl, he said: 'I am concerned and disturbed by what I regard as a heightened real risk that identification by a press blitz will elevate the risk to your life to such an extent that I am satisfied that there is a real and immediate risk to your life if you were to be identified as one of the two girls who murdered Angela Wrightson.'

Mr Justice Globe said the case for naming the younger girl was stronger but that she was also vulnerable. She had been self-harming as recently as last night, he said.

The appalling murder sent shockwaves across the nation and raised urgent questions about how we care for our most troubled children as it emerged the pair had absconded from care homes 18 times in the 30 nights before they battered Miss Wrightson to death.

The authorities have been accused of being 'failures' and the detective who led the inquiry described the murder as the most brutal of his career.

Relaxed: CCTV showed the girls laughing as they returned to the house at around 2am following a 'break'

High spirits: The younger girl even took a photo of her friend in the back of the police van on their way home from the murder. She posted it online with the caption: ‘Me and (name) in the back on the bizzie van again’

In the wake of the convictions, disturbing details emerged of the killers’ feral lifestyles roaming the streets of Hartlepool.

Social workers described Girl A - the older of the pair - as the ‘most volatile young person’ they had come across.

At the age of 11, she began taking drugs and got drunk on a regular basis. And on the day of the murder, she was high on strong painkillers given to her by her mother.

The girl survived a childhood devoid of stability or structure. By the time she reached the care system, she had been exposed to savage domestic violence at home.

She watched boyfriends beat her mother. And the 15-year-old would often fly into fits of rage of her own, trashing her care home bedroom and lashing out at family members.

Murdered at home: Angela Wrightson

The girl has three siblings but shares a father with just one of them. Asked whether she knew the fathers of her siblings, she replied: ‘They are in jail now, all of them.’

Her violent tempers became so serious that she was given a strategy to cope by her local Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service.

Mental health experts said she had a personality disorder and had little understanding of the consequences of her actions. They told her to draw pictures as a way of expressing her anger and calming herself down.

On the day of the attack, Girl A went to her family home, hoping to spend time with her mother. But her mother told her: ‘F*** off and kill yourself.’

Girl B was considered the less aggressive of the pair by a social worker who worked with them, but she is the one who used her smartphone to take chilling pictures of their dying victim.

Girl B, now 15 but who was 13 at the time of the killing, was from a more stable family background than Girl A. Her father is in full-time work and her parents attended court to support her.

But she ran away from home several times. A photo issued by police when she ran away three years ago shows Girl B looking like an ordinary schoolgirl but she was prone to losing her temper. Her parents could not cope and she was taken into care. Although she is a year younger than her accomplice, many said she was the dominant one. Girl A’s sibling said their relationship was a worry because Girl B had the potential to be a bad influence.

The sibling said: ‘I told Girl B to stop coming to my house as I didn’t think that her and my sister were good together. I was aware they were going missing together and this worried me as I thought my sister was too young to be out at night.’

The girls absconded from their care homes 18 times in the month leading up to the murder, and attempts to keep the girls apart were met with disdain by Girl B, who was determined to stay close to her best friend.

She texted Girl A: ‘We’re not allowed no contact with each other? Who’s not allowed no contact with each other? LMFAOOO [Laugh my f*****g a*** off, off, off]. We will be with each other through thick and thin. F*****g crank man, just cos you are my little partner in crime. Putting me out of town, thinking that we still won’t get in touch with each other and s***. Hahaha. Well, I can’t wait to see you when I’m down. Get f*****g mortal!! Love you, Gorgeous Girl!!!!’

Girl B was fixated on her smartphone. In the days before the murder she begged her foster carers for a new phone and was given one.

Final moments: This is thought to be one of the last images of Ms Wrightson, showing her buying something in a shop just hours before she was murdered. The killers knew their victim and used her for alcohol

Tributes: Flowers were left outside of Ms Wrightson's house following the murder on December 8, 2014

She used the phone throughout the attack on Angela Wrightson to take pictures, send messages to friends and play pop music on YouTube.

A social worker said Girl B’s mother was ‘proactive’ in trying to discipline and control her, but she had problems with authority figures and became angry when discussing her care arrangements.

The two teenagers befriended the frail alcoholic, known as 'Alco Ange' because she would buy them cider.

But on December 8, 2014, they turned on the defenceless woman, torturing her for hours in a bloody and horrific ordeal.

Using multiple weapons for the ferocious beating, they ‘heaped indignities’ on their victim by stripping her half-naked and defiling her body.

MOTHER SAYS SHE WILL NOT BE ABLE TO 'BLINK AWAY' IMAGES OF HER DAUGHTER'S BATTERED BODY Miss Wrightson's mother, Maureen, sobbed in the public gallery as the judge summarised parts of her witness impact statement. Mr Justice Globe said: 'She describes the horror of seeing Angie's battered body in the mortuary. She does not think she will ever be able to blink those images away. 'Having seen photographs of what Angie looked like at that time, I readily understand why she is of that view. 'She cannot understand how you could have been as violent as you were. 'She is not alone in that view. 'She had been disgusted by the laughing and giggling and sharing of photographs during the time of and immediately after the attack.' Vulnerable: Victim Angela Wrightson Advertisement

While at the house, the younger girl made a phone call over Facebook to a friend who heard her say: ‘Go on. Smash her head in. Bray her. F****** kill her,’ as the other girl laughed. Police found Miss Wrightson suffered 100 injuries inflicted by weapons including a coffee table, television set, computer printer, wooden stick laced with screws, shovel and a kettle.

The attack began in the early evening. At 9pm, the girls stopped to take a selfie. In the photo, the two girls can be seen smiling, while Angela is cowering in the background with bruises on her face.

The girls left the house for a ‘timeout’ at 11pm, to visit a friend. When he asked about blood on their clothes, they told him they had both fallen over. They returned to Miss Wrightson’s house at 2am, before calling the police at 4am to take them back to their separate care homes. The officers said they were in ‘high spirits’.

The younger girl even took a photo of her friend in the back of the police van, posting it online with the caption: ‘Me and (name) in the back on the bizzie van again.’

Both girls denied murder. The older girl admitted manslaughter on the grounds on diminished responsibility, but the younger girl denied contributing to Miss Wrightson’s injuries, or encouraging her friend. Her defence counsel said she was ‘preoccupied’ with her mobile phone at the time.

During an eight-week trial at Leeds Crown Court, shocking details emerged of how the girls’ lives spiralled into alcohol and violence. They began taking a cocktail of drink and drugs aged 11, frequently ran away from their care homes together and absconded from school. A former neighbour said: ‘Separately they were all right, they could be quite sweet girls, but together they were devils.’

Following their conviction on Tuesday, Det Chief Supt Peter McPhillips, of Cleveland Police, said: ‘This was a highly unusual and shocking incident. Throughout almost 25 years of service I have never come across such a brutal murder committed by such young girls.’

Gerry Wareham, of the Crown Prosecution Service, said the killers showed no remorse but instead ‘laughed and smiled’. He added: ‘In our society it is hard to imagine that two girls of such a young age could be capable of such violence.

‘The attack that the girls committed against Angela Wrightson was brutal and sustained. One can only imagine the fear and distress that she must have felt in the final hours of her life.’

Former Cleveland officer Steve Matthews, who is now standing to run the force on a Ukip ticket, said there were ‘real failures from all concerned’.

‘I am not sure it is a police or a social service problem – it is a combination of all that which has completely failed her,’ he said. ‘They have failed that poor woman for her to die in such a horrific way.

‘And as for the girls, why have people given up on them? When you go into care you assume they will be cared for.’

The Teeswide Safeguarding Adults Board and Hartlepool Safeguarding Children Board have said the three independent reviews into the murder will be made public.

Dave Pickard, independent chair of the Hartlepool Safeguarding Children Board, said: 'Events like this are extremely rare and we owe it to Angela to learn everything we can and, where necessary, share those lessons nationally.'

Judge refuses to identify teenage killers after older girl tries to kill herself

Upholding anonymity: Sir Henry Globe QC

A judge has rejected a petition by the Press to name Angela Wrightson's teenage murderers.

A court order has prevented the naming of the two girls, who are now both 15, since they first appeared before magistrates in 2014.

After they were convicted of murder on Tuesday, a number of media organisations, including the Daily Mail, asked for this order to be lifted.

Mr Justice Globe accepted there was legitimate public interest in the press naming the girls but still refused the application, saying he believed the welfare of the girls was at risk.

He told the court the older girl had tried to kill herself on a number of occasions over the course of the trial, including attempts on court premises.

On one occasion, a court official had stepped in to save her life.

'They (defence barristers) emphasise the fact that each defendant poses a risk of self-harm,' he said. 'In one case, it is a real and present danger.

'Removing anonymity is likely to exacerbate what is already a dangerous situation.'

The judge said if he could be satisfied that both were 'stable, strong-minded defendants', the balance might have been in favour of the lifting of anonymity, but this was not the case.

The court heard the most recent suicide attempt by the older girl was made on Monday while the judge was summing-up the case.

Addressing the older girl, he said: 'Those looking after you are on high alert to look after your safety.

'I am prepared to take notice of your current state of health as a mitigating feature. It is also highly influential in my decision as to anonymity.'

'I am concerned and disturbed by what I regard as a heightened real risk that identification followed by a press blitz will elevate the risk to your life to such an extent that I am satisfied that there is a real and immediate risk to your life if you were to be identified as one of the two girls who murdered Angela Wrightson.'

He said the case for naming the younger girl was stronger but he accepted she was also vulnerable. The judge revealed she had been self-harming as recently as last night.

The judge also referred to the first trial of the two girls which had to be halted due social media posts, which he described as a 'blitz of extreme and disturbing comments'.

The lifting of anonymity was likely to result in a similar reaction and the identification of child witnesses, the killers' families, their carers and their schools.

He added: 'In turn, that could detrimentally affect the lives of both defendants, who remain in fragile and vulnerable emotional states.'

Cleveland Police challenged the Press' request, advising the judge that 'there are no obvious benefits that arise from disclosing the names other than to further sensualise the case.'