Ashley Latty: Trial begins over ‘murder’ of party-goer in Dagenham

Ashley Latty was prounounced dead two hours after the stabbing. Picture: Met Police (Image: Archant)

Ashley Latty, 25, was allegedly kicked, punched and battered in the head with a bottle outside a private party in Dagenham on May 18, before being stabbed five times in the back and chest.

Nana Oppong, 34, of West Road, Stratford; Kestrel Dyer, 25, of Dawson Avenue, Barking; Daniel Agyeman, 24, of Winterbourne Road, Thornton Heath; Nicholas Terrelonge, 28, of Orange Grove, Leytonstone; Jerome Joseph, 28, of Manor Park Road, Manor Park; Damien Carnegie, 29, of Union Close, Leytonstone, and Tyler Burton, 29, of Aberdour Road, Ilford, deny murder and causing GBH. Dyer’s girlfriend Aimee Penfold, 25, of Oaks Way, Epsom, is accused of perverting the course of justice.

Following the party, Ashley, of Leyton, was standing outside the entrance of The Beaver Centre in Selinas Lane at about 5.30am with friends, said prosecutor Simon Denison QC.

“One or more of the seven defendants had spotted him and they decided together to inflict upon him severe violence,” he said.

The Beaver Centre, where the private party attended by both Ashley and his alleged attackers was held (Image: Archant)

“We do not know why and it does not matter why. What they did had no legal justification.”

He added: “At least one of them had a knife. One of them picked up a bottle.”

They stabbed and battered him, the jury was told.

Doctors battled to keep Ashley’s heart beating until he arrived at hospital but he was prounounced dead at 7.15. A post-mortem gave the cause of death as multiple stab wounds.

Tragic: Flowers and police tape outside the Beaver Centre the day after the stabbing (Image: Archant)

“He didn’t stand a chance,” said Mr Denison. “It was sudden, sustained, utterly brutal and without mercy.”

The trial continues.