A Hollyoaks actor died during an ‘extreme’ sex session after he was strangled and tied up for 30 minutes.

Michael Barron, 38, was invited by Josh Baxter to his flat in Blackley, north Manchester, after the pair had exchanged explicit messages on Grindr.

Baxter choked the budding actor’s neck so hard that he fractured a bone and cartilage. 

Baxter restrained Mr Barron face-down on his bed and lay on top of him for a ‘prolonged period’. 

Mr Barron, originally from Ireland, died after suffering a cardiac arrest following a lack of oxygen to the brain.

A court heard Baxter arranged to ignored warnings about the dangers of choking and encouraged Mr Barron to become ‘extremely drunk’.

Baxter, of Blackley, was today jailed for four years. 

A jury found him not guilty of manslaughter, but found him guilty of intentional strangulation or suffocation, and unlawfully inflicting grievous bodily harm.

Michael Barron died during an ‘extreme’ sex session after he was strangled and tied up for 30 minutes

Josh Baxter, 28, of Lakeside Rise, Blackley, was today jailed for four years

Baxter had previously denied all charges

During a sentencing hearing at Minshull Crown Court on Tuesday, Judge Tina Landale said Baxter had arranged to meet Mr Baxter ‘in order to have an extreme sexual encounter’.

The judge said she believed the defendant was ‘well aware of the dangers of choking’ and ‘decided to ignore’ warnings he had received about the practice. 

Judge Landale said Baxter had ‘encouraged’ his victim to become ‘extremely drunk’.

She also noted Baxter had admitted to a probation officer he had ‘repeatedly’ choked Mr Barron while he was tied face down with rope.

Judge Landale added that even though the encounter had been consensual, Parliament had ruled such activity was ‘inherently dangerous’ and that the ‘public must be protected from serious injury or unreasonable risk’.

She ‘rejected’ the defendant’s claim that he was remorseful. 

Judge Landalde said: ‘During your evidence, you demonstrated no insight into your behaviour or accepted responsibility whatsoever.’ 

She added that the defendant had shown a ‘poor understanding of consent and a limited insight into the risk of harm’.

Baxter showed no reaction as he was jailed for four years.

After they had sex at Baxter’s flat in Blackley, Baxter ordered a takeaway on Deliveroo messaged several other men on Grindr and searched on Google: ‘If you accidentally kill someone by strangling them in sex do you go to prison.’ 

Anne Whyte KC, prosecuting, told the trial Baxter had ‘quite specific sexual interests’, which he told Mr Barron about in a message on Grindr after they connected.

In the message, Baxter said he liked it ‘rough’ and asked if Mr Barron would let him ‘choke him, tie him up, pull his hair, spit on him, call him names, get him so drunk he was weak and defenceless and punch him’. He also asked if Mr Barron would ‘do rape role play’.

Ms Whyte said: ‘In other words, Josh Baxter was sexually motivated by high-risk sexual activity.’

In the messages, Baxter and Mr Barron discussed what they liked and disliked sexually, with Mr Barron stating that he liked to be ‘tied, gagged, hooded, totally helpless’ and that he liked ‘pain and torture’.

Ms Whyte said: ‘We can see Mr Baxter telling Mr Barron that when he got to Mr Baxter’s flat, Mr Barron would start drinking vodka until he was so drunk he could barely walk. 

‘Mr Baxter said he would then strip him and start raping and abusing him. Mr Barron consented to that and said Mr Baxter could force feed him vodka as well.’

Baxter said Mr Barron arrived at his flat at 4.27pm. 

They chatted about ‘general things’, including their favourite films. 

He said the pair then began talking about sex and what their ‘limits’ were. Baxter claimed Mr Barron said he did not want a ‘safe word’.

Prosecutors said while Mr Barron was consenting to certain acts, it was ‘no defence’ if Baxter foresaw the risk that what he was going to do would affect Mr Barron’s breathing and that he might suffer serious harm as a result.

‘We suggest he foresaw the risk, and unreasonably took it precisely because the risks and control involved were part of the very specific sexual activity that he wanted to engage in,’ Ms Whyte KC said.

In her closing speech, Louise Sweet KC, Baxter’s barrister, said: ‘He [Mr Baxter] says if there is any possibility that he contributed to Mr Barron’s death, it was not intended by him, and never did he imagine in a million years that he would come to harm, and therefore it was not reckless.’