A teenage girl who killed another girl by plunging a steak knife into her heart walked free from court today.

The jury accepted 19-year-old Chelsea Bennett's claim that she was acting in self defence during a fight in Croydon between two girl gangs.

Bennett said she found the knife on the ground and struck out at Sian Simpson, 17, who was also armed with a knife and was attacking her.

Miss Simpson, known by the nickname "Pit Bull", died from massive internal bleeding after the knife passed through the left lung and entered the heart.

The not guilty verdict caused uproar in the Old Bailey as the victim's family screamed abuse.

The three-week trial heard how the use of knives on the streets of London had become "all too depressingly familiar".

The stabbing in June last year was "the culmination of an escalating fight between two groups of young females - all over the attentions of a young man", the court was told.

The row centred on Nathan Davidson, who had fathered a child by Miss Simpson's cousin but was now the boyfriend of Bennett's close friend.

Violence broke out between the two factions when Mr Davidson went to visit his son.

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