Mum 'killed daughter before asking photographer to create images of her as an angel'

A US mother who asked a photographer to create a series of haunting images of herself alongside her dead toddler daughter has now been charged with the girl's murder.

Jeanie Ditty, a 23-year-old soldier from Fort Bragg, North Carolina, was arrested last week along with her boyfriend for the beating death of her two-year-old daughter, Macy Grace.

A month after her death in December last year, Ditty had asked photographer Sunny Jo to create a set of photos of her with Macy.

Jo specialises in photo editing so that lost loved ones appear in them as angelic figures.

Ditty told Jo that her daughter had tragically died after she became sick from eating a banana and choked on the vomit.

He told The New York Daily News he was so overcome with the woman's story he offered to waive his usual $500 fee.

"My heart dropped to my stomach. She just buried her daughter. I was like, 'you can’t charge someone who went through this. This is to help her get through this tough time'," Jo said.

"It's sickening. I did it to help a grieving mother and I was used. I have not slept in the last few days."

One image shows Ditty walking toward the grave with Macy Grace beside her, while another shows the two reading the girl’s favorite book, 'The Giving Tree', on a blanket in the cemetery.

"She was very specific about what she wanted," Jo said.

Police later found the injuries on the girl's body were "homicidal" and suggested abuse and neglect.

Ditty and her boyfriend, Zachary Keefer, have been charged with first-degree murder.

"This is a truly innocent victim and we are going to do everything we can to get justice for this child,” District Attorney West Billy said after Ditty and Keefer's court appearance on Monday.