- Mum-of-four Chloe Bashford was close to Derek Martin, her mum’s ex-partner, who she saw as a father figure
- The day Chloe and her husband Josh disappeared, Derek took all four Bashford children to McDonald’s
- When the grisly truth emerged, it was revealed Derek Martin had murdered them both in a violent and cold-blooded attack
Sipping a cup of coffee, Chloe Bashford tucked into breakfast at a local cafe with her stepdad Derek Martin.
It was June 2023 and the pair had just dropped off Chloe’s four children, then aged 15, 12, seven, and four, to school.
Chloe, 30, didn’t know what she’d do without Derek, then 64 – he was such a help to her.
He’d divorced Chloe’s mother, Elaine, many years earlier, but she had always seen him as a father figure.
Derek had his flaws, serving jail time for burglary. But over the past few years Derek and Chloe’s bond had grown.
He was like a grandfather to her kids, always ready to do school pick-up or drop-off for Chloe and her husband Josh, 33.
Derek also happily helped out with jobs around the house, and loaned Chloe cash when money was tight.
Ever thankful, Chloe repaid Derek with homecooked meals.
Now, after ducking to the supermarket, Derek drove Chloe home and busied himself cleaning her windows.
They’d organised to go and look at a new car together with Josh, when he got home from work later.
That afternoon Derek drove to collect the two youngest Bashford children from school, and messaged the older two to meet him at a coffee shop, something that he did every week.
There, Derek told the kids their parents had argued badly and suggested grabbing a Macca’s feast for dinner.
Chloe’s 12-year-old daughter, worried she’d heard nothing from her mum, sent her a message.
Are you mad with me? she wrote.
But there was no reply.
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On the way to Macca’s, Derek stopped briefly at a supermarket, hopping out near a bush then getting back in the car.
Over dinner, Derek chatted about their days and the football, then drove them to his ex-wife Elaine’s house.
He told the kids to go inside while he parked the car.
But when Elaine opened the door to her grandkids, she was confused.
She and her husband Graham had been packing to go away for the weekend and weren’t expecting to see the kids.
Bizarrely, Derek never came back from parking the car.
As hours passed with no contact from Chloe or Josh, panic grew.
Then at 6.11pm Elaine received a curiously cryptic text message from Derek reading, I’m so sorry, I can’t believe what I’ve done. Please look after the children really well. Don’t take the children home x.
Half an hour later, Derek walked into a police station where he confessed to killing two people.
How could he have murdered Chloe and Josh in such a violent and cold-blooded manner?
Police mounted a search of Chloe and Josh’s house in Newhaven, UK, and discovered the couple’s bodies, littered with stab wounds.
As a broken Elaine cared for the devastated Bashford children, the family were stunned by Derek’s brutal betrayal.
How could he have murdered Chloe and Josh in such a violent and cold-blooded manner?
In August 2023, Derek Martin pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter on grounds of diminished responsibility.
His plea wasn’t accepted by the prosecution, and his trial for murder began in October 2025.
The court heard how, after Derek and Chloe had rowed about money, he’d erupted, hitting her multiple times in the head with a hammer.
Then he retrieved a large kitchen knife, stabbing Chloe a total of eight times to the upper back and abdomen, two wounds penetrating to a depth of 20cm.
An autopsy determined Chloe had died of unsurvivable blood loss.
When Josh arrived home minutes later at around 12.20pm, Derek chased him upstairs, slashing at his back with a knife.
Terrified, Josh fled into the master bedroom where Derek stabbed him four times.
As he lay dying, Derek strangled him with a rope.
In an attempt to conceal his wicked crimes, Derek cleaned the knife and some of the bloodstains then changed his clothes.
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Next he took the door handles off the bedroom door, which he claimed was to protect the children.
Martin’s defence claimed he had a history of depression and had killed Chloe and Josh in a depressive moment.
But five psychiatrists agreed that any loss of self-control was hard to reconcile with Martin’s use of different weapons and Josh’s killing.
The jury remained unconvinced too, and found Derek Martin guilty of two counts of murder.
In a victim impact statement, the couple’s eldest child, Brooklyn, then 18, told the court he was plagued by nightmares of the day of the murder.
‘The tragic loss of our parents has torn our worlds apart. They were our foundation.’
‘He had a temper, but I never thought he’d be capable of doing anything like this,’ she said.
Speaking of Martin, he said, ‘I will never forgive him.’
Chloe’s grieving mum Elaine said she would ‘never be the same’ after the loss of her daughter, calling Martin ‘like Jekyll and Hyde’.
‘He had a temper, but I never thought he’d be capable of doing anything like this,’ she said.
In November, in Brighton Crown Court, Derek Martin, 67, was sentenced to life with a minimum of 29 years, reduced to 26 years, seven months and seven days, for time served.
Justice Justine Thornton said Martin’s attack was ‘driven by rage and resentment’.
‘As a result of your actions, their families will suffer for the rest of their lives.’
