Three teenagers have been charged with the murder of a man in Kent.

Kent Police were called to an incident in Leysdown-on-Sea, on the Isle of Sheppey, shortly after 7pm on Sunday.

Alexander Cashford, 49, from Kent, was found dead at the scene, having suffered multiple injuries.

He was allegedly assaulted following a “disturbance involving a small group of people”, according to police.

A 16-year-old girl and two boys, aged 14 and 15, were arrested and taken into custody shortly after.

The three suspects, who were all from London, were charged with murder by joint venture on Tuesday.

They are due to appear before Medway Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday. The teenagers cannot be named for legal reasons.

A 12-year-old girl was arrested on Tuesday in Basildon, Essex, in connection with the incident.

She remains in custody while enquiries continue.

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Kent Police are appealing for witnesses who have not yet spoken to detectives to contact the force.

Marnie’s first serious relationship came when she was 16-years-old.

Warning: This article contains references to strangulation, coercive control and domestic abuse.

She was naturally excited when a former friend became her first boyfriend.

But after a whirlwind few months, everything changed with a slow, determined peeling away of her personality.

“There was isolation, then it was the phone checking,” says Marnie.

As a survivor of abuse, we are not using her real name.

“When I would go out with my friends or do something, I’d get constant phone calls and messages,” she says.

“I wouldn’t be left alone to sort of enjoy my time with my friends. Sometimes he might turn up there, because I just wasn’t trusted to just go and even do something minor like get my nails done.”

He eventually stopped her from seeing friends, shouted at her unnecessarily, and accused her of looking at other men when they would go out.

If she ever had any alone time, he would bombard her with calls and texts; she wasn’t allowed to do anything without him knowing where she was.

He monitored her phone constantly.

“Sometimes I didn’t even know someone had messaged me.

“My mum maybe messaged to ask me where I was. He would delete the message and put my phone away, so then I wouldn’t even have a clue my mum had tried to reach me.”

The toll of what Marnie experienced was only realised 10 years later when she sought help for frequent panic attacks.

She struggled to comprehend the damage her abuser had inflicted when she was diagnosed with PTSD.

This is what psychological abuse and coercive control looks like.

Young women and girls in the UK are increasingly falling victim, with incidents of domestic abuse spiralling among under-25s.

Exclusive data shared with Sky News, gathered by domestic abuse charity Refuge, reveals a disturbing rise in incidents between April 2024 and March 2025.

Psychological abuse was the most commonly reported form of harm, affecting 73% of young women and girls.

Of those experiencing this form of manipulation, 49% said their perpetrator had threatened to harm them and a further 35% said their abuser had threatened to kill them.

Among the 62% of 16-25 year olds surveyed who had reported suffering from physical violence, half of them said they had been strangled or suffocated.

Earlier this year, Sky News reported that school children were asking for advice on strangulation, but Kate Lexen, director of services at charity Tender, says children as young as nine are asking about violent pornography and displaying misogynistic behaviour.

“What we’re doing is preventing what those misogynistic behaviours can then escalate onto,” Ms Lexen says.

Tender has been running workshops and lessons on healthy relationships in primary and secondary schools and colleges for over 20 years.

Children as young as nine ‘talking about strangulation’

Speaking to Sky News, Ms Lexen says new topics are being brought up in sessions, which practitioners and teachers are adapting to.

“We’re finding those Year 5 and Year 6 students, so ages 9, 10 and 11, are talking about strangulation, they’re talking about attitudes that they’ve read online and starting to bring in some of those attitudes from some of those misogynistic influencers.

“There are ways that they’re talking about and to their female teachers.

“We’re finding that from talking to teachers as well that they are really struggling to work out how to broach these topics with the students that they are working with and how to make that a really safe space and open space to have those conversations in an age-appropriate way, which can be very challenging.”

Charities like Tender exist to prevent domestic abuse and sexual violence.

Ms Lexen says without tackling misogynistic behaviours “early on with effective prevention education” then the repercussions, as the data for under 25s proves, will be “astronomical”.

At Refuge, it is already evident. Elaha Walizadeh, senior programme manager for children and young people, says the charity has seen a rise in referrals since last year.

“We have also seen the dynamics of abuse changing,” she adds. “So with psychological abuse being reported, we’ve seen a rise in that and non-fatal strangulation cases, we’ve seen a rise in as well.

“Our frontline workers are telling us that the young people are telling them usually abuse starts from smaller signs. So things like coercive control, where the perpetrators are stopping them from seeing friends and family. It then builds.”

Misogyny to violent behaviour might seem like a leap.

But experts and survivors are testament to the fact that it is happening.

The US State Department has accused the UK of having “significant human rights issues”, including restrictions on free speech.

The unflattering assessment comes via a new version of an annual Human Rights Practices report, with its publication coinciding with Vice President JD Vance’s holiday in the Cotswolds.

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It says human rights in the UK “worsened” in 2024, with “credible reports of serious restrictions on freedom of expression”, as well as “crimes, violence, or threats of violence motivated by antisemitism” since the 7 October Hamas attack against Israel.

On free speech, while “generally provided” for, the report cites “specific areas of concern” around limits on “political speech deemed ‘hateful’ or ‘offensive'”.

Sir Keir Starmer has previously defended the UK’s record on free speech after concerns were raised by Mr Vance.

In response to the report, a UK government spokesperson said: “Free speech is vital for democracy around the world including here in the UK, and we are proud to uphold freedoms whilst keeping our citizens safe.”

The US report highlights Britain’s public space protection orders, which allow councils to restrict certain activities in some public places to prevent antisocial behaviour.

It also references “safe access zones” around abortion clinics, which the Home Office says are designed to protect women from harassment or distress.

They have been criticised by Mr Vance before, notably back in February during a headline-grabbing speech at the Munich Security Conference.

The report also criticises the Online Safety Act and accuses ministers of intervening to “chill speech” about last summer’s murders in Southport, highlighting arrests made in the wake of the subsequent riots.

Ministers have said the Online Safety Act is about protecting children, and repeatedly gone so far as to suggest people who are opposed to it are on the side of predators.

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The report comes months after Sir Keir bit back at Mr Vance during a summit at the White House, cutting in when Donald Trump’s VP claimed there are “infringements on free speech” in the UK.

“We’ve had free speech for a very long time, it will last a long time, and we are very proud of that,” the PM said.

But Mr Vance again raised concerns during a meeting with Foreign Secretary David Lammy at his country estate in Kent last week, saying he didn’t want the UK to go down a “very dark path” of losing free speech.

The US State Department’s report echoes similar accusations made by the likes of Nigel Farage and Elon Musk.

The Trump administration itself has been accused of trying to curtail free speech and stifle criticism, most notably by targeting universities – Harvard chief among them.