Ryan Herbert, 16, and Brendan Harris, 15, savagely kicked and stamped Sophie Lancaster to death as she begged them to stop beating her boyfriend.

The 20-year-old's pleas as she cradled Robert Maltby in her arms went unheeded as Harris delivered a flying kick to her head and Herbert volley-kicked her in the face "like a ball in flight" during the assault in a park in Bacup, Lancashire.

Neither of the defendants knew their victims and the only motive was that they simply looked different to them, Preston Crown Court heard.

Miss Lancaster, a gap year student, died from serious head injuries two weeks after the attack in Stubbylee Park in the early hours of August 11 last year.

Her boyfriend, art student Robert Maltby, 21, also a Goth, survived but suffered memory loss and has no recollection of the attack.

Mr Maltby, who did not attend court, said he had lost his "entire world" and wished he had been kicked to death instead so his girlfriend could have been spared.

A jury of nine men and three women took just two hours to unanimously find Harris guilty of murder.

Harris, of Spring Terrace, Bacup, had denied the murder charge but pleaded guilty to causing grievous bodily harm to Mr Maltby after drinking two litres of cider, a bottle of Stella Artois lager and "quite a lot of" peach schnapps.

Herbert, of Rossendale Crescent, Bacup, who had also been drinking alcohol throughout the night, admitted murdering Miss Lancaster before he was due to go on trial. He also pleaded guilty to assaulting her boyfriend.

Three other youths, two aged 17 and one 16, who cannot be named for legal reasons, earlier pleaded guilty to assaulting Mr Maltby. Charges of murdering Miss Lancaster against them were dropped.

'Laughing and joking'

Outside court, Miss Lancaster's mother, Sylvia, 52, who works with young offenders in her job at youth advisory care service Connexions, said society needed to make changes to prevent similar deaths.

She said: "Sophie was a thoughtful, sensitive individual and she would not have wanted her death to have been in vain.

"I hope therefore that, as a society, we can use what has happened to reflect on where we are going and what changes we need to make to prevent others suffering in this way."

Det Supt Mick Gradwell, senior investigating officer at Lancashire Police, criticised the conduct of the defendants and their families throughout the proceedings.

He said that when Harris was initially interviewed about the assaults he was "laughing and joking" with his mother.

"The interviewing officer had to speak to Harris's solicitor to make sure they knew the gravity of the situation because they were laughing and joking," he said.

"The general attitude of the defendants' parents during the whole process has been appalling."

Unprovoked assault

The jury at the two-week trial was told the young couple, who had been going out for six months, were walking home from a friend's house to their flat in King Street shortly before midnight when they began chatting with a group of teenagers.

They drifted into the park where the good-natured conversation continued and they even handed out cigarettes to the group.

However, the mood changed suddenly when the five teenage boys launched an unprovoked assault on Mr Maltby in the skate park area.

Someone was heard to shout "let's bang him" and then Harris started the orgy of violence with a flying kick to his head.

The gang, described in court by the prosecutor Michael Shorrock QC as "acting like a pack of wild animals", then punched, jumped and stamped on his head until he was unconscious.

Miss Lancaster cried for them to stop as she cradled her boyfriend's head on her lap but then Herbert and Harris turned on her.

When paramedics arrived and found the couple lying side by side covered in blood, they could not tell what sex either was such was the severity of the injuries. The pattern of some footwear was still on Miss Lancaster's head.

Both fell into comas but Miss Lancaster never regained consciousness and died in hospital 13 days later.

It emerged at the end of the trial that Herbert and Harris had previous convictions after they chased a youth out of Stubbylee Park and assaulted him.

Both were given six months' community service orders at Rossendale Youth Court for the attack in April last year.

Police also released footage of Herbert which showed him in a mocked-up music video called "Hands up for Bacup".

In it, he is seen with three other youths performing a rap about the town over footage of various local landmarks.

In one repeated section, all four can be seen menacingly swinging wooden poles as they stride towards the camera.

Sentencing was set for April 28, along with the three other youths who were remanded in custody at the start of the trial.

>> Boy found guilty of Goth park murder (with video)

Click the audio play button above right to hear the 999 call made to police after the attack.

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