SHE was still just a teenager, but Linda Lietaviete had the world at her feet.

Coming to the UK from her native Latvia in 2008, she enrolled at Glenmoor School straight away despite speaking no English at all.

And at the end of the academic year, the youngster was almost fluent in the language – and even had a Dorset accent.

By the time she had completed her studies, she had notched up a string of good passes in her GCSEs and became the youngest person on a business administration course at Bournemouth and Poole College.

Her older sister Laura said: “When we arrived, I’d had around seven years of English lessons, but Linda had none at all.

“We got here in the August, and in September, we went to school. Linda just got around it so quickly. She was so clever.”

The student had big ambitions for the future, dreaming of a future in the business world.

But she tempered her drive with her work in the community, volunteering in a Boscombe charity shop raising money for Hampshire children’s hospice Naomi House.

She also gave her time in the Army Cadet Force until she reached college.

Mum Ginte said: “She was a 16-year-old girl, but her mind was like that of a grown up.

“She was independent. She wanted to stand on her own two feet.”

For Linda, that meant helping friends.

She worked at an Indian takeaway in Poole based just yards away from where her friend Diana Plume had a job.

While Linda often finished earlier, she would sit and wait for Diana, or even meet her as she got off the bus at night to ensure she made it safely home to the flat they shared with Linda’s family.

Laura said: “She was never sat at home.“She was always busy, always out with her friends. Linda didn’t like to be alone when there were people to spend time with.”

Ginte added: “She was such a happy person, always singing or street dancing.

“She was happy within herself.”

And Linda’s joy and lively nature ensured she had many friends.

“Even when I’d had a bad day, Linda would always know what to say to make me laugh,” Laura said.

“She was so funny. She and Diana would come and visit me on the bus, and when they left, I’d look out of the window and see them doing the dance from Gangnam Style down the street together.”

One of those friends was Alvin Santos, originally from the Philippines, whom Linda met when she was just 14.

Now aged 26, Santos developed an ‘infatuation’ with the schoolgirl, at one point buying her a necklace for Valentine’s Day.

However, Linda told him that she wanted only friendship from him – something he eventually appeared to accept.

Laura said the family were “in total shock” when told that police had arrested Santos on suspicion of Linda’s murder in the early hours of December 13 last year.

“None of us believed it could have been him,” she said.

“I had met him twice. I knew him as her friend Alvin.”

She said that when she first saw Santos at Bournemouth Magistrates’ Court, he had appeared “so tiny” to her – and no match for tough Linda.

“I said, ‘How can someone like that hurt Linda?’. She was so strong,” Laura added.

“But he took her away from us forever.”

Man found guilty of murdering Linda Lietaviete.