A wealthy aristocrat and her partner caused the ‘entirely avoidable’ death of their baby daughter by going on the run in dangerously cold temperatures without food or warm clothing, a court has heard.
Constance Marten, 37, and Mark Gordon, 50, are said to have kept the girl’s birth ‘their little secret’ after their four older children were taken into care.
They sought to evade authorities in January 2023, spending thousands on taxis criss-crossing the country before making their way to the South Downs where they went ‘off grid’ and slept in a ‘flimsy’ tent, the Old Bailey heard.
Prosecutor Tom Little KC told jurors Marten came from a ‘very wealthy family’ and could have bought whatever her baby needed from her trust fund but instead carried her around in a Lidl bag for life while scavenging for food.
Jurors heard the couple began sleeping in a tent on January 8, 2023, and were next seen four days later at a Texaco garage where Marten bought snacks with cash. There was no sign of the baby.
Mr Little said: ‘You will have to consider if the baby had by now died of hypothermia, or had been smothered and suffocated in the obviously dangerous sleeping conditions in that tent or whether she was still alive at this point but that her fate was sealed by the conduct of the defendants carrying her in a bag for life.’
After the baby died, the defendants continued to sleep rough and scavenge in bins for food while carrying the body in the same Lidlbag.
The child’s decomposed body was eventually found by police in a disused shed amid rubbish a few days after the defendants were detained in Brighton on February 27, 2023.
In a police interview, Marten said the baby died after she fell asleep with her tucked under her coat.
She claimed the child had ‘ample clothes’ when she and Gordon decided to take themselves out of society to ‘save her from the services’ – which Mr Little said was a lie.
Gordon agreed with her account and claimed to police it was something ‘nobody could have ever have anticipated’.
But jurors were told the risk was obvious and the couple had been warned before of the danger of living in a tent and sleeping directly with a baby.
Mr Little told jurors: ‘They put their relationship and their views of life before the life of a little baby girl.
‘Rather than act in the obvious best interests of a vulnerable baby and one that they should have cared for and looked after, they decided instead that they knew best.
‘They decided to ignore the advice that they had previously been given. They decided that in the middle of winter and in obviously dangerous weather conditions they would deprive the baby of what it needed – warmth, shelter, protection and food and ultimately safety.
‘They essentially went off-grid and lived in a tent with hardly any clothes, no means of keeping and remaining warm and dry and with scarcely any food.’
He said the defendants’ decision to camp on the South Downs raised the risk of hypothermia and suffocation.
It was their ‘grossly negligent and obviously dangerous conduct’ that caused the death of the baby, jurors were told.
Mr Little added: ‘After the baby died, in January 2023, the defendants did not hand themselves in but instead remained off-grid, trying to hide for a number of weeks, leaving the body of their dead baby in a shopping bag covered in rubbish, which they carried around and then left in a disused shed.’
Jurors were told the defendants were convicted at an earlier trial of concealing the birth of a child and perverting the course of justice.
The pair, of no fixed address, have denied manslaughter and a second charge of causing or allowing the death of a child between January 4 and February 27, 2023.
Earlier, jurors were told that Gordon was not in the dock with Marten but that he might join the proceedings later by video link.
Judge Mark Lucraft KC warned jurors against doing any research about the case or ‘jumping to any conclusions’ before hearing all the evidence.
The Old Bailey retrial is expected to last for up to eight weeks.
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