A severely malnourished six-year-old girl suffered an "atrocity" of neglect before her lifeless, lice-ridden body, weighing just 18kg, was rushed to hospital, a court tasked with sentencing her mother has heard.

Crystal Leanne Hanley, 49, faced the South Australian Supreme Court on Tuesday after pleading guilty to criminal neglect causing death over the death of her six-year-old daughter, Charlie Nowland, in July 2022.

The mother-of-five also pleaded guilty to separate counts of criminal neglect relating to two other children.

Hanley, of Munno Para in Adelaide's north, rocked and sobbed silently in the dock as victim impact statements from two of her children and two first responders were read to the court.

Charlie, who had never been taken to a doctor in her life and had never attende

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