Two men to be sentenced after girl, four, killed in hit-and-run collision

Two men are due to be sentenced after a hit-and-run crash which killed a four-year-old girl.

Violet-Grace Youens was struck while walking in St Helens, Merseyside, on March 24.

Aidan McAteer, 23, has admitted causing her death by dangerous driving and causing serious injury to her grandmother, 55-year-old Angela French, who was with her at the time.

Dean Brennan, 27, has pleaded guilty to aggravated vehicle taking and assisting an offender.

Both are due to be sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court.

At a hearing last month Judge Dennis Watson QC told the pair they were facing lengthy jail sentences as he further remanded them in custody.

In the days after the crash, McAteer's mother Alicia made a public appeal for her son to return home after he fled the country.

The next day he was arrested at Manchester Airport and questioned by detectives.

Brennan admitted obtaining McAteer's passport and supplying it to him.

After her death, the family said the donation of Violet-Grace's organs had saved two other lives.

In a message on her Facebook page, her mother Rebecca Youens said: "My brave baby girl saved two lives by donating her kidneys and pancreas.

"I am truly heartbroken but proud of my little fighter."