CCTV shows Constance Marten and her lover with their newborn 'hidden up her coat'
29 January 2024, 22:35 | Updated: 30 January 2024, 07:32
Footage has been played at the trial of Constance Marten and her boyfriend allegedly showing her with their newborn baby hidden underneath her puffer jacket as the pair strolled into a bus station.
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Constance Marten and Mark Gordon stroll into bus station
Runaway heiress Marten, 36, and her boyfriend Mark Gordon, 49, were spotted on CCTV footage from January 5 at Bolton bus interchange, shortly after the couple’s car had burst into flames, the Old Bailey heard.
The footage shows the couple walking into the station with Marten taking the lead and gripping her waist with both hands, below a bump under her coat, where her baby was allegedly being concealed.
The aristocrat and her boyfriend have been accused of the manslaughter by gross negligence of their newborn, Victoria, after the infant was found dead on March 1 in a Lidl bag covered in rubbish inside a disused shed.
The pair deny the charges.
Shortly after giving birth, Marten took her unclothed baby and together with Gordon, the couple went on the run, prompting a nationwide search further spurred by concern for the wellbeing of both mother and her newborn.
The pair’s car was discovered burning on the M61 near Manchester with the body of the Peugeot 206 blackened by the flames, and the interior of the car left charred in the intense heat of the flames.
A placenta was found in the car which alerted officers to the birth of the child, and the hunt for the couple intensified for the pair who had been living off-grid before their arrest in February last year.
It is believed that Marten has accessed money from a trust fund to pay for a 270-mile taxi from Liverpool to Essex, with Gordon handing the driver £400 in £20 notes.
Marten had received nearly £19,000 in payments into her account from a trust fund while on the run, the jury heard.
The couple had spent nearly two months camping in a blue tent in wintry conditions in South Downs, East Sussex, before the baby allegedly froze to death.
Marten comes from an aristocratic family living on the Dorset estate Crichel House, where the wealthy heiress spent much of her youth.
Her father was a page to Queen Elizabeth II, while her grandmother was a childhood friend of Princess Margaret and goddaughter to the Queen Mother.
The couple met in 2016 and had four children who were all taken into care. Marten had given birth to her first child using a fake Irish accent and pretending to be a traveller when she arrived at the hospital, jurors have heard.
Marten and Gordon deny manslaughter by gross negligence, concealment of the birth of a child, cruelty to a person under 16, perverting the course of justice, as well as causing or allowing the death of a child.
The charges date between January 4 and February 27, 2023. The trial is expected to last six weeks.
