'I was set on fire in a field and watched my skin melt off - the pain left me shaking'

A teenage girl was left screaming in agony with “melted” skin after a young boy burnt her in an unprovoked .

Alyssia-Rae Yates, said the male perpetrator, believed to be as young as 11, kicked a containing molten plastic towards her while she hung out with friends in a field in St Helens, .

The 13-year-old player said: "My friends were trying to pat it down, but then they realised it wouldn't come off. So they took me home. In the ambulance, my legs were still red and I was shaking a lot because of the shock of it happening. It was really unexpected, I didn't think anything would happen. It was a big shock."

Recalling the excruciating pain following the incident, which happened on the evening of October 11, Alyssa said: "I immediately went to the ground and screamed. When I dropped to the floor, the plastic was melting into my skin. It was just going deeper and deeper at that point. It was just going straight through."

Alyssia's mum, Laura Hutton, 36, called an ambulance after one of her pals helped her back home. She believes the boy kicked pieces of molten plastic towards her daughter deliberately. Laura said: "As Alyssia has moved to join her friend to get past, the boy has dropped a lighter into the fire and then kicked the fire directly at her."

"At this point, the fire was between two and three feet high. From where the fire has been built, it's a full 360-degree circle. He could have kicked it in any direction, but he's kicked it at her. Then one of the friends, her rugby mates, has carried her part way home. It's only a five-minute journey from where she was to the house."

The mum had at first mistaken the black patches on Alyssa’s leg for mud from playing sports. But as soon as she realised they were burns, she immediately put the 13-year-old into the shower and tried soothing the wounds. Laura added: "I thought she had been playing rugby or something, her legs were black. She was crying and trying to tell me she had been on fire."

Alyssia was taken to a local hospital by ambulance where she underwent treatment to have the plastic was removed.

said they have so far not made any arrests and the investigation is ongoing.