GERALDINE and Patric Kriégel adopted Anastasia, known as Ana, from Russia when she was two-and-a-half years old with the hope of giving her a happy and comfortable life in Ireland, as well as long summers holidaying in her new father's native France.
In the end she died without ever realising her full potential, a child murdered by children, in a case that has shocked a nation.
Ana had loved her early school years in Lexlip, Co Kildare, but had struggled with adolescence and the changes that came with it.
Sensitive in nature and tall for her age, she had become isolated from her peers, was being relentlessly bullied online and was receiving counselling at the time of her death.
Read More: Murdered schoolgirl Ana Kriegel was talented teenager who loved to sing and dance
This - the court was told - made her mother Geraldine instantly suspicious on returning from work to find out that her daughter had gone out with Boy B.
"What the hell was she doing with him? No-one calls for Ana," she told her husband.
Details of the frantic search when she didn't return her mother's messages and the agony of having to identify their child in a Dublin morgue were all heard in court during the harrowing seven-week trial.
Boy A and Boy B were just 13 years old when they lured Ana from her loving home to a violent and merciless death.
In the aftermath they attempted to conceal their actions, the lies told during police interviews and the not guilty pleas meaning that Ana's parents were subjected to prolonged trial and very public agony - there was no remorse shown from either of the killers.
This have been comparisons drawn between the killing and that of Liverpool toddler Jamie Bulger in 1993.
Jon Venables and Robert Thompson were both 10 when they lured the two-year-old away from his mother to a railway line where they tortured, beat and sexually assaulted him.
Unlike Venables and Thompson, Boy A and Boy B will not be named.
Ana Kriégel's innocence and longing for friendship made her vulnerable to those who wanted to take advantage of her, and her killers despite their young age knew this.
An examination of two phones found in Boy A’s bedroom revealed almost 12,500 images, the vast majority of which were pornographic.
The phones’ hard drive showed several pornographic videos had been accessed online including one with a title referring to a woman called Anastasia. Another referred to 'Russian Teens'.
The age of criminal responsibility in the Republic is 12 years old, Boys A and B are the youngest people in the history of the state to be convicted of murder.
In the aftermath of this terrible case questions must be asked about what we as a society are doing to protect women and young girls from femicide and sexual assault. And why more is not being done to both study and combat the impact that easily-available violent and misogynistic pornography has on young minds.
We must understand what made two 13-year-old boys violent killers and more importantly what can be done to make sure it never happens again.
We must also remember the short life of Anastasia Kriégel, who loved sparkle and colour, who loved to sing and dance, who was proud of her Siberian heritage and was an accomplished swimmer, loved dearly by her family, liking nothing better than cuddling with her mother on the sofa to watch a movie.
A girl whose kind and gentle nature was cruelly exploited by two wicked boys for their own gratification.
