She was a teenage mother with an unwanted baby. He suffered from learning difficulties, had smoked cannabis by the age of 12 and had tried to kill himself by 15. They met, and the fate of four-year-old Leticia Wright was sealed. Ian Noble and Andrew Douglas report.

JOBLESS Peter Seaton would get up at noon and do little or nothing to help around the house -spending most of his time sitting on the stairs smoking cannabis.

He preferred to smoke skunk, a potent form of the drug, which girlfriend Sharon Wright would obtain for him -ironically from Leticia's natural father, Zaheer Hussain.

The trial jury heard the 22-year-old loner smoked up to £140 worth of cannabis a week. He said it helped him to relax.

He also admitted that at times, he became paranoid and did not like people to look at him.

Wright, 23, blamed Seaton for the horrific injuries suffered by Leticia, saying he went into a rage when he ran out of cannabis.

But Seaton, who admitted biting Leticia, denied causing the fatal injuries, saying he never looked after her alone.

Meanwhile, friends and neighbours of Wright were alarmed when they saw her being "heavy-handed" with her daughter.

Whatever the truth, Leticia's body had suffered more than 100 injuries, which police believe were inflicted in the last four weeks of her painful and lonely life -when in the care of her mother and Seaton.

Seaton moved into the house in Almondsbury Park, Huddersfield, last August. Four-year-old Leticia had only three months to live.

Seaton met Wright in Hartlepool when she moved in across the road with her boyfriend.

Seaton was living with girlfriend Natalie Watson, but started an affair with Wright after her boyfriend, Stuart Robertson, was jailed in February last year.

After two weeks together, the pair took Leticia to stay with Seaton's mother in Northallerton, North Yorkshire, and then his father in Kettering, Northamptonshire.

When Wright was offered emergency accommodation in Almondbury Bank, she kept quiet about Seaton because there was a warrant out for his arrest.

He was wanted for breaching his probation after he was found with a pool cue that had been sawn in half.

The court heard that Seaton had several convictions as a teenager, including three for assault, one in which he attacked a police officer.

His mother, Donna Seaton, still lives in a semi-detached house in Meadow Lane, in the Ashlands area of Northallerton, where Seaton was brought up along with his four sisters.

His childhood was spent on the sprawling former council estate now largely owned by the Broadacres Housing Association.

But he started using cannabis as a 12-year-old and at the age of 14, he was sent to a special school in Kendal, Cumbria, because of learning difficulties. Only a year later, aged 15, he tried to commit suicide by hanging himself.

He returned to North Yorkshire, where he developed a love for car engines and attended Darlington College, studying for an NVQ in mechanics.

But his interest in mechanics waned and he drifted for a time, carrying out labouring jobs.

He eventually secured a job as a shop outfitter near London and began seeing a girl called Natalie Watson.

Originally from Hartlepool, she headed home to be near her family when she became pregnant, and it was while living together there, in Hereford Street, that Seaton met Wright.

Seaton's mother still maintains he could not be responsible for Leticia's death.

She said: "He is a quiet person and does not really say much, but you could leave him in a room full of kids and they would be okay.

"He grew up with kids and has never done anything to harm them."

Seaton's father, Robert, who lives in Kettering, also lays the blame for the murder on Leticia's mother.

He said: "You just knew there was something about Sharon, and I should have phoned Social Services.

"One day at my flat, Sharon started shouting at Leticia and gave her a look of pure evil, and the child kept crying.

"In all the time I saw her with the child, I never saw her cuddling or playing with her."

Wright had an equally troubled upbringing. She was raised in Dewsbury, near Huddersfield, and left home at 16 to live in a hostel.

She became pregnant at the age of 17 and, despite not wanting the baby, was persuaded to have Leticia by warehouse worker Mr Hussain.

They lived in Wakefield before Wright left with Leticia to live with Robertson in Hartlepool.

Yesterday, Mr Hussain, said: "She was a beautiful little girl, always happy and smiling, and she had everything to live for. Losing Leticia has left a huge gap in our lives."