A 36-year-old man has died after being attacked on a night out celebrating his birthday.

Stephen McGiffen from Oldham, turned 36 on Thursday and had been celebrating with his girlfriend and others on Yorkshire Street.

In the early hours of Friday morning the emergency services were notified that a man had been assaulted and on attendance, found Mr McGiffen lying on the floor with serious head injuries.

He was taken to hospital where his family remained at his bedside but today he died.

His family are being offered support by specially trained officers and a Home Office post mortem examination will take place tomorrow.

Two men – aged 19 and 20 – were arrested on suspicion of assault and have since been bailed pending further enquiries.

Detective Chief Inspector Stuart Wilkinson of GMP’s major incident team said: “Our investigation has today taken a tragic turn with a family losing Stephen, someone so precious to them.

"We will continue to do whatever we can to support them and hope we will be able to provide them with the answers they are currently looking for.

“What we know so far is that they were a lot of people that came out of the bars and pubs on Yorkshire Street to witness the incident — if you haven’t yet got in touch with us, we need you to do so to tell us what you saw.

“Did you see an altercation between several people near to the Old Bank pub? Do you know who is responsible for Stephen losing his life?

“In the last 24 hours, his family’s lives have been turned upside down — please, do the right thing and pick up the phone.”

Anyone with information should call detectives on 0161 856 9908 quoting reference number 234 of 13/07/18 or the independent charity Crimestoppers, anonymously, on 0800 555 111.