A 34-year-old man has been charged with the murder of Olivia Pratt-Korbel, the girl shot dead in her own home in Liverpool, along with the attempted murder of her mother. Thomas Cashman, from the west Derby area of the city, is accused of killing the nine-year-old, who was shot in the chest. Another man, 40-year-old Paul Russell, also from west Derby – close to the part of the city where six weeks earlier Olivia was killed – has been charged with assisting Cashman. Announcing the development during a press conference at Merseyside police headquarters, the chief crown prosecutor, Maria Corr, said the charges had been authorised after “the review of a file of evidence” received from the force. Both suspects are due to appear at Liverpool magistrates court on Monday. Until the significant announcement, 11 men had been arrested without any charges brought over a shooting that stunned the nation and led to claims that police had faced a wall of silence. During Saturday night’s press conference, DCI Mark Kameen again urged people to come forward and “speak to us”, reiterating calls for CCTV, dashcam or smart doorbell footage to be forwarded to the force. Olivia was killed as her mother tried to stop a gunman entering their house in Liverpool on 22 August. Her mother, Cheryl Korbel, was shot in the wrist as she tried to shut her front door on the gunman, who was chasing and firing at another man, Joseph Nee, a convicted criminal. Cashman has also been charged with the attempted murder of Nee and Korbel. Nee, 35, seeing the front door open had run towards it and forced his way inside. The gunman then fired several shots, one of which injured Cheryl Korbel and fatally hit Olivia in the chest. Neither of the men was known to the family. Police have previously identified two weapons used by the killer, a Glock-type self-loading 9mm pistol and a .38 revolver the force said was responsible for the fatal shot. A record reward of up to £200,000 has been offered in the search for the gunman by Crimestoppers. It will be paid for information leading to the conviction of Olivia’s killer. Officers have spent 15,000 hours on the case, examining about 2,000 exhibits and thousands of hours of CCTV. Olivia’s funeral was held on 15 September at a packed St Margaret Mary’s Church, streets away from where the shooting happened. Mourners were asked to wear a “splash of pink” to remember the “chatty and bubbly” girl. Kameen last night praised the courage of Olivia’s parents and said both were in “our thoughts”.