A woman has been arrested following the murder of a little girl in Bolton.

Earlier today (Sunday 22 March 2020) at 2:34pm, police were called to Queen’s Park in Bolton following reports that a child had been stabbed. 

Ambulance and police attended and found that a seven-year-old girl had been attacked by a woman with a knife. The child sustained extremely serious injuries and, despite the best efforts of her family and medical responders, she sadly died a short while later. 

A 30-year-old woman was detained by a member of the public immediately after the attack and was arrested by police at the scene, initially on suspicion of attempted murder and subsequently for murder. 

The woman is not known to the family of the little girl.

Assistant Chief Constable, Russ Jackson of GMP, said: “Words cannot describe how awful this attack is. The family were out in the park, enjoying the spring sun when in a totally unprovoked and random attack this little girl sustained horrendous injuries and sadly died a short while later.

“A 30-year-old woman who was not known to the family was detained by a member of the public and then arrested by the police. She is currently in custody for murder and it is expected she will be interviewed by detectives later. 

“We are working to understand the motive for this completely random and brutal attack. We understand that the woman has some history of mental illness and we are working to understand if this played any part in her motive. 

“We have sent specialist family liaison officers to support the family. This is a family’s worst nightmare. The incident is horrendous and I cannot begin to imagine what the family of this little girl are going through.  

“We are determined to quickly understand how this came to happen, leaving a young family so distraught and so devastated in an instant.