Twisted killer tells mother: ‘You’re next’
A killer with previous convictions for using cars as weapons is facing at least 25 years in jail for dragging a father-of-two to his death for half a mile.
Martin Eastwood, 22, had driven at two other victims before he trapped Liam Dent, 25, beneath his stolen Ford S-Max.
Witnesses heard the victim’s blood curdling screams as the car zig-zagged up the road at up to 32mph.
Eastwood and two friends including Daniel Morris, 22, had become involved in an argument with a group of men outside the Lucky Rover pub in Chessington, Surrey, on July 26, 2019.
During the incident a pub sign was thrown at a Volvo driven by Morris and the windscreen was smashed.
They drove away then returned in two stolen cars, with Morris driving a stolen black BMW and Eastwood at the wheel of the S-Max to embark on what the Judge has called a ‘revenge attack’.
Eastwood rammed Mr Dent, who became caught under the wheels of the car as the S-Max ran him over.
His shoes, money and phone were strewn across Moor Lane, Chessington, as the car drove off.
Police also recovered a bank note which had been in his pocket and had been torn to shreds.
It is said that Morris ‘beeped in order to warn’ his friend that Mr Dent was caught under the wheels of the S-Max.
He later returned with Eastwood to set fire to the S-Max and then singlehandedly burned the Volvo.
Eastwood’s girlfriend, Jasmine Robinson, 19, hid him from police and bought him coach tickets using a false name.
The couple exchanged a series of text messages declaring their love for each other but callous Robinson told the killer: ‘All the things we were planning to do n you let it all go for some f—ing irrelevant boy’.
She added: ‘You f—ed it all up and for what? A couple of seconds of empowerment.’
Eastwood, who has never taken a driving test, had wept in court as he claimed he had no idea Mr Dent, who he did not even know, was trapped under his car and it was all an accident.
Stacey Dent today read out her impact statement to the court, describing her son as he
best friend.
Looking directly at the dock, she said: ‘Martin Eastwood you took my son from me in the most callous and cowardly way.
‘It is me that has nightmares.
‘I don’t get that picture of my son out of my head.
‘I had to see the complete destruction that evening and for what Martin?
‘Being from Chessington?’
Ms Dent told the court that her son had two children.
Of Liam’s son, she said: ‘He shares his birthday with the same person who killed his father.
‘Every birthday you have Martin, I want you to think of [him] spending his birthday without his daddy at the hands of you.
‘Martin Eastwood should never be allowed a single day of normal life, he robbed my son of his.’
Ms Dent addressed Robertson and Morris as well, slamming their lack of remorse.
‘I tried in the beginning to convince my children that Liam would have been unconscious on impact,’ she said.
‘But the evidence rolled out in court proved the absolute worst.
‘He was tortured and he was left for dead, screaming for help.
‘Why couldn’t you have just stopped and spared my son his life?
‘There is no other sentence to taking a person’s life but life, and the other victims deserve justice too.’
Eastwood was convicted of causing grievous bodily harm after he drove at a man on a bike in 2018.
The cyclist was seriously injured and the bike was dragged 20 metres up the road.
Another victim was fortunate to escape serious injury in 2019 when Eastwood tried to rob him after driving his car at him as he walked along with his girlfriend.
Eastwood was ealier convicted of these two offences and will be sentenced for them today.
He had also shared footage on social media showing him driving his car at a cyclist and accelerating away laughing.
When Eastwood was 16 he was jailed for two years and eight months for robbing two young boys of their phones at knifepoint in a park in Sheffield.
The following year he offered cannabis to a man and, when he refused, Eastwood produced a knife, pinned the man to a wall and robbed him.
Eastwood was convicted of murder while Robinson was convicted of assisting an offender which carries the maximum of five years in jail.
Morris earlier admitted manslaughter.
Michelle Nelson, QC, prosecuting, said the Ford S Max car had been stolen from the Chessington area on 11 July 2019 and was being driven on false number plates.
‘Liam Dent’s body was struck, caught under the car and driven a further half-a-mile, where the Ford accelerated up to speeds of 32mph, before Liam’s Dent’s body was deposited on a road called Moor Lane.’
Witnesses heard Mr Dent scream, ‘Oh Bruv’, above the sound of the revving engine and try to grab the road as he was dragged past them while a horrified onlooker screamed: ‘There’s a f—ing person under the car.’
Ms Nelson said: ‘He was alive, his head lifting and his arm moving, but his injuries were such that he could not survive them and at about 12:50am Liam Dent’s life was pronounced extinct.
‘Police officers examined the scene, they walked from where Liam Dent’s body had been left back to Osborne Way.
‘Along that route they found one of his trainers, a scratched phone case, ripped bank notes, and loose coins.
‘They saw skin along that path that they took, and it looked like it had been torn or burnt off and drag marks along Moor Lane and Osborne Way.
‘In Osborne Way, they saw a Transport for London post that had been hit and was bent over.
‘At 1:58 that Saturday morning, police received reports of a vehicle fire at a place called Cyclamen Way.
‘By the time they arrived they found the Ford S Max burnt out.’
Nine days after the murder, on 4 August, Robinson bought a coach ticket for Eastwood under the name ‘Jordan McKenzie’.
Robinson’s mother later transferred £18 to allow her daughter to buy a coach ticket from Sheffield to London on 13 August, jurors heard.
The prosecutor read a series of text exchanges between Eastwood and Robinson following their arrests.
On 14 September, Eastwood texted his girlfriend: ‘When I wake up in the morning I got murder on my mind.’
Ten days later, Robinson messaged him: ‘Love you enough to be prepared to get locked up with the key thrown away if it meant keeping my baby safe, I would do anything for you you know xx.’
Days later she added: ‘I want you to know I don’t expect nothing from you just love and respect that is it.
‘None of that materialistic sh–t it don’t bother me one bit.
‘I just want to help you change your ways and keep you away from all this sh–t once you are out.’
Messages were then read out from 30 September showing a heated exchange between the couple about what his time in jail meant for their relationship.
‘I’m here for a few months if I get a good few years I know what would happen,’ Eastwood said.
Robinson replied: ‘If you got life off that is a different story so why are you chatting sh–t? I can wait a few years.’
Eastwood said: ‘There you go if I got life off you would just leave me to die I know you would.’
Robinson went on: ‘Why you talking like saw you got 20 years ahead of you? You got two months left.
‘And that is not going to happen because you are out in two months stop going on like you’re locked up forever and just look forward to getting back to normal with me.
‘I love you for f–k’s sake if anything ever happened to you I couldn’t live.’
On 11 October Robinson texted her jailed boyfriend: ‘I’m holding sh–t down wtf you on about?
‘I think you’re forgetting what the f–k I’ve done for you.
She later messaged him: ‘You should really really f—ing respect that I’m still here after you’ve jeoprodarsed [sic] my entire future with you and everything we’ve spoke about having all because of this one dumb stupid f—ing movement.
‘All the things we were planning to do n you let it all go for some f—ing irrelevant boy.
‘You f—ed’ it all up and for what? A couple of seconds of empowerment.’
Ms Nelson added: ‘She knew what he had done, she knew what he was wanted for, a very serious murder.
‘She was in love and wanted to protect him.’
Giving evidence Eastwood claimed Morris was ‘angry’ about the Volvo getting attacked as he was planning to sell it that day.
He said they drove back to the area near the Lucky Rover looking for the men responsible.
But he explained that both cars came under attack from a group of young men hurling bottles and he ended up reversing into a lamppost.
Eastwood said he heard a ‘really loud bang’ and there was ‘smoke inside the car’ as he hit the post.
‘At the time there was so much noise I thought it was the windows coming in, that was before I hit the post.’
He said he had a ‘ringing noise’ in his ears.
‘I couldn’t hear anything at all. It was all just blurred out.
‘I was just in shock at the time I couldn’t hear anything. I just wanted to get away from the place.
‘The steering wheel was really heavy. The car was just zigzagging side to side.’
His barrister, James Bloomer, asked: ‘Did you at that stage think you had hit a person?’
Eastwood replied: ‘I didn’t, no. ‘I thought the lamppost was underneath my car.
‘I was panicking at the time I thought they were chasing me still.
‘I could hear lots of bangs.’
Eastwood said he was ‘panicking’ and his head was ‘in a mess’ when Morris set light to the S-Max.
Following his arrest two days later Eastwood was found in possession of a hunting knife and he admitted that offence.
Eastwood, of Epsom, denied murder and was convicted.
Robinson, also of Epsom, denied assisting an offender and was convicted.
Morris, of no fixed address, admitted manslaughter.
Judge Wendy Joseph is due to pass sentence this afternoon.
Eastwood was jailed for life and told he must serve a minimum of at least 30 years for the ‘revenge’ murder.
Responding to a comment made by Eastwood in the dock Stacey Dent, Liam’s mother, pointed at him in the dock and said: ‘He just said we’re next. We’re next are we, Martin?’
Another Dent family member said: ‘You ain’t f—ing getting out Martin.’
Judge Wendy Joseph, QC, said of the attack: ‘No one should die like that.
‘No mother should have to sit in the road with her dying son after these injuries had been inflicted.
‘There is no way around it, this was a cruel death.’
Referencing the Dent family’s impact statements, the judge said: ‘Their words must stand as a permanent rebuke which I suspect Mr Eastwood will never forget.’
The family were visibly relieved at the lengthy minimum term.
Ms Dent clutched her son’s hand at the news.
Directly to Eastwood, judge Joseph said: ‘There can be no more serious offence than to take the life of another.
‘You will remain in custody for the rest of your life unless the parole board sanctions your release.
‘I have no doubt at all that from the moment you knocked him down and set off from Osborne Way you knew he was under the car.
‘It might have been said if you were truly remorseful you would have spared Mr Dent’s family this trial.’
Morris, who admitted manslaughter, was jailed for five and a half years.
The judge told him: ‘It was you who turned the car…after the first confrontation.
‘If you had not done that none of this might have happened.
‘You did not envisage and did not encourage the unlawful violence.
‘I accept that you were shocked by what happened.
‘You left the scene out of shock and panic.’
Earlier, James Scobie, QC, for Morris, said his client ‘frantically’ hooted his car horn at Eastwood ‘to try and stop what was going on’ when he spotted Mr Dent under the wheel.
Mr Scobie also told the court his client did not grow up with ‘the best possible chances’ and has no previous convictions for violence.
‘Obviously very young at the time,’ the barrister continued.
‘He has already learned a lesson.
‘There is genuine remorse here.’
Jasmine Robinson was sentenced to two years imprisonment, suspended for two years after Judge Joseph said: ‘You provided a safe haven when he needed it.
‘He was able to evade apprehension for 20 days.
‘Your messages to him…suggest you knew the seriousness of the offence for which the police wanted him.
‘You are self-deluding, you are very immature, you are profoundly foolish, but I do not think for one moment you appreciated the extent of Mr Eastwood’s offending.
‘And it is obvious that you have the capacity to grow and to mature.’
Alistair Grainger, defending Robinson, had compared how she assisted her boyfriend to other cases.
‘No evidence was lost or destroyed,’ Mr Grainger said.
The barrister also spoke of her remorse.
In a letter to the court, Robinson said: ‘I’m so regretful of my actions during these times.
‘I never imagined myself to be in this position, this is so unlike me.
‘I’m so sorry to the family of Liam Dent for all that they have been through.’
Mr Dent’s family had earlier accused her of ‘smirking’ at them throughout the trial, but the court heard that, according to a psychological assessment, such an expression may be a reaction to stress rather than a show of callousness.
Mr Grainger also spoke of her history of trauma, good character and young age in mitigation.
‘She has expressed a desire to go into the world and be a decent law-abiding woman in the future.’
Eastwood, of Epsom, denied murder and was convicted.
The life sentence with a minimum of 30 years for the murder runs concurrently to 10 and a half years for causing grievous bodily harm (GBH) with intent in 2018, seven years for the attempted GBH with intent and four years for robbery during an incident in 2019.
Robinson, also of Epsom, denied assisting an offender and was convicted.
She received two years in prison suspended for two years. The 19-year-old must also do a rehabilitation activity of 12 days of work and live for three months under an 8pm-7am curfew.
Morris, of no fixed address, admitted manslaughter and was jailed for five and a half years.
