A WOMAN who branded a girl with an iron during a frenzied attack has been told she faces up to seven and a half years in jail.

Mariam Naeem, 20, burnt the victim repeatedly before arming herself with a knife with a five-inch blade and a hammer.

She then chased the girl and carried on raining blows on the victim in the ‘unprovoked and sustained’ assault at a house in Burnley last June, the town’s crown court heard.

Naeem, said to have suffered strong mood swings at the time and to have had to seek medical treatment over a ‘personal problem’ shortly before she struck, put the victim in hospital for 10 days.

The girl suffered, knife wounds, severe burns to her arms, body and face as well a fractured skull and brain damage caused by the hammer blows to her the head.

The victim was said to have been taken to Manchester Children's Hospital, where she was treated by a team of neurosurgeons, paediatricians and plastic surgeons.

The hearing was told how the defendant apparently turned on the victim for nothing.

Her vicious outburst came about eight months after she attacked her partner, scratching his car with a knife and also sinking her teeth into him. She had admitted assault by beating.

Naeem had originally pleaded not guilty to causing grievous bodily harm to the child with intent.

She changed her plea to guilty on the day of trial, meaning the young victim was spared the ordeal of giving evidence.

The hearing was told how the girl did not want to go to court and see the defendant.

Naeem, who has been on remand, was kept in custody and will be sentenced by Judge Jonathan Gibson on May 14.

The judge, who ordered pre-sentence and psychiatric reports on the defendant, will have to decide whether or not she is dangerous.

Judge Gibson, who said the one aspect of the case that gave him some concern about Naeem's state of mind was her hospital visit at the time of the offence, told her he would be sending her to prison for a maximum of seven and a half years.

The defendant appeared before Burnley Magistrates to be sentenced in October 2008, after causing £800 damage to her partner's car and biting him.

The court had heard the defendant was then in a relationship with an older, divorced man and her family did not approve. She had wanted to marry him but could not win their permission.