Constance Marten and lover declare they saved child ‘nicely nourished’

A pair accused of killing their new child child trashed a vacation cottage by leaving wine stains on a quilt, urine on the ground and cat litter on chairs, a court docket heard right now.

Aristocrat Constance Marten, 36, and Mark Gordon, 49, brought about the loss of life of Victoria by dwelling in a tent ‘off grid’ in the course of winter so she wouldn’t be taken away from them by social providers, it’s claimed.

The child’s placenta was present in a burnt-out automotive on a Manchester motorway sparking an enormous police hunt because the couple traversed the UK looking for an escape route from the nation, the Old Bailey heard.

Marten and Gordon spent almost two months tenting in a blue tent within the bitterly chilly South Downs close to Brighton earlier than the infant, sporting solely a onesie, allegedly froze to loss of life.

Victoria was later discovered lifeless within the Lidl ‘bag for all times’ the place prosecutors say she had spent most of her life – however Marten and Gordon declare they saved her ‘heat, dry and well-nourished’ earlier than she all of a sudden died.

The couple met in 2016 and had 4 youngsters in fast succession who have been all taken into care after Marten gave beginning to her first youngster utilizing a faux Irish accent pretending to be a traveller, jurors have heard.

The couple deny the manslaughter of Victoria by gross negligence, concealment of the beginning of a kid, cruelty to an individual underneath 16 and perverting the course of justice by disposing of the physique. They additionally deny inflicting or permitting the loss of life of a kid.

Today, the proprietor of a vacation cottage in Northumbria instructed the court docket it was trashed by Marten and Gordon when the couple stayed over Christmas 2022. 

Maria Richardson stated in a press release learn to court docket that it was the primary time she and her husband had rented their vacation cottage, which that they had renovated themselves.

But Marten and Gordon left wine stains on the quilt, urine on the lavatory ground and cat litter on the lounge chairs, the court docket heard.

She stated that Marten had booked the two-bed cottage on Booking.com on December 20, 2022 and requested to check-in that evening.

She stated: ‘On December 20, 2022 at 4.04pm my husband got here downstairs to inform me we had our first reserving.

‘The reserving was for a similar day for six nights and the entire value was £367.20.’

Marten then messaged Ms Richardson, saying: ‘Your property appears good even with out a bath- it is a very nice cottage, one I intend to inform my buddies about.’

Marten later rang her and requested how she may get the keys, the court docket heard.

Ms Richardson stated: ‘I requested the place she was coming from and he or she acknowledged Sheffield. I defined it will be pitch black resulting from time and gave her the important thing code.

‘She sounded very younger and demure throughout the telephone name. I bear in mind pondering she was in a busy place- it sounded very noisy and on the time I believed it was a busy workplace.’

The court docket heard that Marten later texted her to say: ‘Hi Maria thanks very a lot for the prosecco and chocolates- that was a lot appreciated. I’m curious- did you do the inside design your self? Thanks, Constance.’

Ms Richardson then despatched texts on Christmas Eve and on Boxing Day with check-out directions, however Marten didn’t reply.

She and her husband then went to the cottage, which has a yard overlooking woodland, on 28 December.

She stated: ‘As I went to place the important thing within the entrance door we each seen the lounge curtains have been nonetheless closed.

‘The very first thing I seen was candle wax everywhere in the lounge desk and on the carpet.

‘There have been washed up pans on the kitchen sink, soiled cups, glasses. The hob was caked in meals and there have been meals stains throughout.

‘There have been urine stains everywhere in the bathroom and ground. There was cat litter everywhere in the ground and chair in the lounge.

‘There have been quite a few empty water bottles across the bed room ground, empty cartons of fruit, the quilt had pink wine stains and the throw had a curry stain.

‘In the again bed room the bedding on each single beds was unslept in however disturbed.’

The bedsheets from the double mattress have been discovered laundered within the washer, the court docket heard.

Marten claimed to police she gave beginning within the vacation cottage however the prosecution dispute this.

Earlier at court docket this morning, concluding his opening, prosecutor Tom Little KC stated: ‘You know that the defendants did all the pieces they might to hide the beginning, simply as that they had tried to cover the being pregnant.

‘They instructed no person. They didn’t register the beginning as you might be required to do by regulation. There have been no ante-natal or post-natal medical checks. The child was not born in hospital.

‘From all of the proof you may safely infer that each defendants acted always desiring to and did conceal the beginning of this youngster.’

He stated they disposed of the physique in a location the place it was unlikely to be discovered.

‘It doesn’t need to be fully hidden and be incapable of being discovered regardless of how important the police investigation was,’ Mr Little added.

‘Here the defendants had hidden the physique in a bag for all times beneath garbage in an unlocked shed while it decomposed.

‘If somebody got here alongside and located a bag for all times which seemed to be stuffed with garbage what are they going to do with it?

He stated Marten’s account that she wished to protect the physique for an post-mortem didn’t make sense because the physique was left to decay.

He stated: ‘It is obvious that the actions have been deliberate. They made the choice as soon as they turned more and more excessive profile that they might not stay in hotels- they have been going to need to go off-grid.

‘It was a deliberate resolution to stroll into wild moist, chilly situations. This is we are saying a transparent case of cruelty by advantage of neglect and publicity.

‘There is not any proof of pure illness, nor proof of violent assault.

‘There are two competing mechanisms of loss of life. The first is that the deceased was uncovered over time to the intense chilly in a tent, with out correct entry to heating, lodging, or sufficient clothes and meals.

‘This offers rise, you could assume, to an apparent danger of hypothermia for a new child child.

‘The second potential mechanism is the eventual account given by Marten in interview that the kid died in some way when she fell asleep sitting up and cross legged.

‘The prosecution will invite you to reject what she says as to the mechanism of loss of life.

‘Indeed how does she know even on her personal account what brought about the loss of life if she was asleep?

‘There has been no clarification of precisely how she smothered or suffocated her youngster, particularly from a sitting place with crossed legs.

‘Any try by her now to assemble a distinct model of occasions must be handled by you with a heavy diploma of scepticism.

‘On Marten’s model of occasions the infant was born on December 24, 2022 – the query which will come up then is the place was it once they have been picked up by the restoration driver on December 28, 2022 once they had damaged down?

‘As Marten was to concede in her interview the situations through which the defendants have been dwelling when sleeping tough quickly worsened and rapidly reached a stage that we recommend have been inhuman.

‘We invite you to conclude that the defendant’s account as to the date of loss of life was designed to present the impression that the kid had not lived in these harmful situations for very lengthy, however as a substitute had died on the primary or second evening through which the couple stayed in a tent.

‘Some of the proof is on the contrary. The youngster was alive, on the proof, for over a month after the couple determined to reside off-grid.’

He stated the defendants would nonetheless be responsible of inflicting the loss of life of their youngster even when Marten’s account about her being smothered was true.

‘They knew that there was a major danger of significant hurt from co-sleeping as a result of that they had been repeatedly instructed to not do it earlier than.

‘Marten was exhausted as a result of she was sleep disadvantaged and since the defendants have been transferring continually by means of the countryside to search out new locations to pitch their tent.

‘By the time of their arrest the defendants have been filthy, exhausted and ravenous. They have been plainly in no place to take care of a baby and this is able to have been apparent to them.

‘There would plainly be a danger, in such circumstances, of a mother or father falling asleep with the kid in a really confined atmosphere and smothering or harming the kid.’

Outlining Gordon’s case, John Femi-Ola KC stated: ‘The first situation is the date of beginning and the date of loss of life of child Victoria.

‘The defendant’s case is that child Victoria was born on December 24, 2022 and that she died on January 9, 2023.

‘On January 12, 2023 there’s petrol purchased – and Constance Marten stated that after the infant died she didn’t know what to do and the explanation that petrol was purchased was to cremate child Victoria however she could not try this.

‘Bearing in thoughts the acquisition of petrol on January 12 why is that the prosecution proceed to say that child Victoria may nonetheless be alive a number of weeks after January 12?

‘Is it so {that a} remark could be made that child Victoria was carried round in a Lidl bag for all times as late as the center of February?’

He continued: ‘It is the rivalry on behalf of Mr Gordon that not looking for antenatal care, not having a child exterior of the hospital, not having post-natal care doesn’t quantity to an offence anymore than not registering the beginning of a child for 40 days.

‘It is the rivalry of the defence that the physique was not disposed of however moderately that there was an try and protect the physique for all the explanations summarised in opening that Constance Marten gave in her interview.

‘She wished to search out out why her beloved child died, sure, her beloved child. She wished there to be a autopsy.

‘The Crown asserts that the negligence, the cruelty was the continuing failure to supply heat, shelter from the chilly.

‘A failure to feed the infant and to supply medical help when the infant turned chilly resulting from publicity within the wind and the rain.

‘The defence contend that the infant was saved heat and dry and was fed such that she was nicely nourished.

‘The child didn’t require medical help and died within the circumstances so heartbreakingly described by her mom in an interview with the police.

‘Importantly eminent pathologists have been instructed by the crown to find out the reason for child Victoria’s loss of life.

‘They conclude that the reason for loss of life was unascertained. It is right that the physique had decomposed to an extent however there’s pathologically no proof of any signal of violence, no signal of exterior or inner accidents.

‘The circumstances leaves the prosecution to say that the infant should have died by motive of hypothermia or publicity or co-sleeping.

‘There is we contend no medical prognosis of loss of life being attributable to hypothermia or publicity.

‘And it’s contended that in these circumstances what Constance Marten has to say to the police as to how child Victoria died is fully in line with the discovering of the pathologist.

‘The defence will contend that there was no intention to pervert the course of justice by intentionally permitting the physique to decompose in order to keep away from a postmortem.

‘It was made fairly clear in her interview she wished a autopsy, she wished to understand how her beloved child died. And so, the crown say, they went off the grid. 

‘As you hearken to proof you’ll want to ask your self – have been they pushed off grid?’

Gordon sat alone within the dock right now and Marten was not current.

Ms Marten’s mom Virginie de Selliers and her brother Tobias Marten each attended court docket.

Marten and Gordon deny manslaughter by gross negligence, concealment of the beginning of a kid, cruelty to an individual underneath 16 and perverting the course of justice.

They additionally deny inflicting or permitting the loss of life of a kid.

The trial is ready to final six weeks.