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Twenty years ago, two teenage girls were killed as they stood outside a new year party.

The killings of Letisha Shakespeare and Charlene Ellis sent shockwaves through the city of Birmingham and beyond, and led their families to dedicate themselves to campaigning against gun and gang crime.

In the parish church of Aston in Birmingham, murals lie on the marble floor marking the murders.

Letisha, 17, and 18-year-old Charlene died on 2 January 2003. They were the innocent victims of a botched drive-by shooting as rival Birmingham gangs fought out a brutal turf war.

Charlene's twin sister Sophie, their cousin Cheryl Shaw and friend Leon Harris were also injured.

Letisha's mother Dr Marcia Shakespeare MBE said she still could not believe two teenage girls could be killed by gunmen armed with a Mac-10 sub-machine gun.

Since then, she has been campaigning - first for justice for the girls, and then against violent crime.

In 2005, four men were convicted of the murders in a trial which became the longest in English criminal history and the first to allow evidence from anonymous witnesses.

Dr Shakespeare was one of the first to stand up against the gangs and those with guns.

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