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Court heard the mother-of-two held her daughter Leila in her arms and shielded her from both the blaze and from Saed as he repeatedly knifed her.
Her cry for help alerted neighbours who called police and firefighters to the terrace house in Rawtenstall, Lancs.
She suffered fatal wounds to her face, back, chest, leg and arm plus 65% burns all over her body and would die four days later due to her injuries.
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The scared little girl now has physical and mental scars and suffers flashbacks of the horrific evening in which she shouts: "Mummy hot, Leila hot, daddy, daddy."
Leanne's other child, Lola, aged four, was at a sleepover during the attack has asked relatives:
"Why did my mummy have to go to heaven?"The court heard Saleem Saed a care worker had purchased metal handcuffs, duct tape and white spirit sometimes in July last year.
He had then bought petrol from a garage as part of his inhumane plan to kill Miss Collopy's in revenge for her leaving him.
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Today he began a minimum 30 years behind bars after he admitted murder and arson with intent to endanger life.
Julie Doherty, Leanne's mum, read a heartbreaking statement in court in which she said:
"Leanne was a very proud mum with her whole life ahead of her and the emptiness we now feel will never go away."
"I have a longing for her to burst through the door and tell us her latest news - but I know I will never again be able to hug her, laugh with her, cry with her and even argue with her."
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"I cry for the children and the fact they must grow up without a loving and caring mummy. The measure of what they will have to face is too distressing to think about - their own wedding and their children will never have a maternal grandmother."
"A couple of weeks ago they were chanting in the back of the car 'we want mummy, we want mummy' and 'come down from heaven' I had to drive through my tears and try and comfort them at the same time."
"Lola has asked many times why did this have to happen to my mummy and this is a question we can't answer. She wants to know why it was her mummy that had to go to heaven she struggles every day."
"Lola's journey is going to be difficult but Leila is going to be unimaginable the loss of her mother at the hands of her father."
"She has scars both physically and mentally and will do for the rest of her life. We have had to observe her flashbacks and we will have to explain why she doesn't have a parent."
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"Every day is difficult, grief follows us like a shadow. There's a huge Leanne-sized hole in all of our hearts. Memories and photographs are all that's left but any happy memories and photographs are too painful to look at."
"All she ever wanted to be was a mummy. I cry for what she went through that night. I think of how terrified she must have been, the pain she endured and I feel guilty I was not there."She and Said began dating in 2015 and had entered into a Muslim ceremony of marriage not recognised under UK law.
They would split up last year due to Said's possessive and violent behaviour.
She moved into a rented property with her two girls whilst Said moved back in with his mother.
Preston Crown Court heard Said couldn't accept the romance was over and in the weeks before the killing he texted Miss Collopy saying:
"I can 't go out, I can 't do anything. I just think day and night, the world is a blur, nothing matters anymore."
"You have got what you wanted - my life is ruined."Said who had an access visit with his daughter while Miss Collopy went out with friends lured Leanne home that evening claiming she needed to come home as he had forgotten the child's cot.
Mr Francis McEntee prosecuting said:
"This was a ruse to draw Miss Collopy home, so he could carry out this planned attack. Inside the premises he engaged in a sustained, brutal attack, upon Miss Collopy, repeatedly stabbing her about the head and body with a kitchen knife that he had brought with him for that purpose."
"That attack continued even whilst Ms Collopy had their small child, in her arms. Indeed, this young woman's last, heroic, act was to save her daughter's life from the flames that were about to engulf them."
"The body mapping shows that there are blows all around Leanne's body, blows to the back, the side, the front, neck and head. That could be consistent with her seeking to shield the child."He continued:
"When the police arrived, the property was dark and was full of smoke and the officer could just make out the outline of a small child sat upright on the kitchen worktop."
"He reached in through the window and pulled the child out and could just make out two people lying on the floor."
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"The baby's eyes were wide open and staring, and she didn't make a sound. She had burns on her face and hands and was wearing a baby grow covered in blood - but the blood on the baby grow was from the child's mother."
"There was a scratch on the child's back caused by the knife wielded by the defendant."
"The only proper inference is that the child had been in her mother's arms during a significant part of the attack and that Miss Collopy's last actions were to try and save her child from the fire. The petrol was purchased specifically for use in the murder of Leanne Collopy."
"The presence of petrol on Leanne's clothing is because the petrol was being used by the defendant to set Leanne alight, whilst her daughter was in her arms."The court heard a Boots parenting bag was found on the pavement outside the house containing a blue dressing gown belt, sleeping tablets, "Kandytoys" metal handcuffs, a broken bottle of Smirnoff Raspberry Vodka, a roll of Unibond black duct tape and a 750ml plastic bottle of ASDA White Spirit.
Said, who was also injured in the blaze, was not interviewed until September 26 but apart from confirming he was the owner of a BMW car driven to the murder scene, all questions were met with silence.
He later claimed he only bought handcuffs and duct tape because he was seeing prostitutes and said he had turned up to the house to threaten suicide.
In mitigation, defence counsel Mukhtar Hussain QC said:
"It goes without saying that this is a sad and tragic case."
"The statements read by the family are the very thing that was the major part of this defendant's decision to plead guilty."
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"He didn't want Leanne's family to go through and relive the circumstances of these very tragic events."But jailing him for life the Judge Mr Justice Robert Jay told an emotionless Said:
"This was a vicious, premeditated attack on Leanne spurred by your unconstrained jealousy."
"It's clear to me you had difficulties accepted your relationship with her was over and you were reaching the conclusion if you couldn't have Leanne you would have to kill her."
"You gave Leila to Leanne armed with two knives with the intent of killing her and destroying her body."
"Either Leila was in her mothers arms during a significant part of the part of the attack or she was nearby, Leanne picked up Leila because she was on fire and doused her with water. Effectively that was her final conscious decision."
"Leila was old enough to appreciate something terrible had happened and the mental and physical effects will be permanent. What happened will never leave the minds and souls of this family."
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