Runaway aristocrat Constance Marten denies carrying baby in 'supermarket bag' while on the run as trial continues
28 April 2025, 15:29
Aristocrat Constance Marten has denied carrying her newborn girl in a supermarket bag while on the run, calling it “absolutely absurd”.
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The runaway couple went off-grid in early 2023 in an alleged attempt to stop the newborn baby being removed from their care.
Marten, 37, and Gordon, 50, have been charged with the manslaughter of their baby daughter, Victoria.
The newborn girl died after the couple fled in early 2023 - leading to a high-profile manhunt for the runaway pair.
Giving evidence on Monday, Marten told jurors she and Gordon made the decision to flee to the countryside on January 7 2023 whilst in London because they had “so many people looking at us”.
A buggy that Victoria had been carried in was abandoned before they took a taxi from Whitechapel to Green Lanes in Haringey, the court heard.
Marten said that Gordon had held the baby on his chest under his jacket in a sling during that time, and that she had done so “in the same manner”.
Asked if there was any point where the couple were carrying her in the supermarket bag, Marten said: “Absolutely not. The whole point was to keep her hidden from view.
“It’s absolutely absurd.”
Wearing a green jumper in the witness box, Marten told the court she and Gordon had wanted to find a flat in East Ham which they would pay for in cash, but that their plans “were changing all the time”.
The court heard the couple spent several hours in restaurants and shops in East Ham on January 7 before taking a taxi to Whitechapel, where Gordon purchased a tent from Argos.
Asked about why they decided to travel to the South Downs that day, Marten said: “I think we noticed that there were just so many people looking at us.
“We thought with more people we might blend in more (in East Ham).”
Asked if Victoria was exposed to wet and rain in Whitechapel, Marten told jurors her pram had a plastic cover over it.
Marten and Gordon wanted to go to Plymouth whilst they were trying to figure out a way of getting abroad without their passports, which had been destroyed when their car caught fire several days before, she told the court.
They then ordered another taxi but it instead dropped them off at Green Lanes.
Marten said: “I thought he (the taxi driver) recognised us and I got scared that he would take us to the nearest police station.”
Marten and Gordon spent an hour in the area before getting a third taxi to Newhaven in East Sussex, the court heard.
Marten told jurors they only intended to stay in the tent “for a day or two” and had considered the idea of handing Victoria in to the local authorities as they arrived in Newhaven in the early hours of January 8.
But they decided to walk away from the urban area towards hills after it had stopped raining, she said.
She denied that either the parents’ clothing or Victoria’s got wet while they waited for rain to stop near to a petrol station.
Asked if the conditions were suitable for camping, Marten said: “If we knew it was something we could not bear, we would have gone to plan B and handed her in.”
Marten told the court she was “relatively warm” and they were all dry when they first got into it.
She said she did not go outside the tent on January 8 except to go to the toilet.
Gordon, who was sat in the dock on Monday, elected not to give evidence in the trial.
The pair, of no fixed address, have denied the gross negligence manslaughter of their daughter and causing or allowing her death between January 4 and February 27 2023.
Last week, aristocrat Constance Marten told the court she and her partner Mark Gordon did 'everything we could' to protect their baby.
Marten and Gordon deny the allegations of manslaughter and causing or allowing their daughter's death.
Jurors have been informed that the defendants were previously convicted of concealing the birth of a child and perverting the course of justice.
It has been alleged that the baby died from hypothermia or was smothered while co-sleeping with the couple in a "flimsy" tent on the South Downs.
Marten began giving evidence last Thursday morning - after previously being delayed due to complaints of a headache and toothache.
Dressed in a blue blouse and navy blazer, she told jurors she "absolutely" loved baby Victoria.
When questioned on whether she had done anything to harm the baby, she replied defiantly: "Absolutely not, we did everything we could to protect her".
Marten told the court the baby was born on Christmas Eve in 2022 and died a few weeks later on 9 January.
Marten said that after giving birth to the baby at a cottage in Northumberland, the couple attempted "to move jurisdictions every three or four days, rent a place in cash and live there as long as I can with Victoria".
Marten has claimed her other children were "stolen by the state".
She said they moved around a lot to avoid "one single authority" having jurisdiction over her daughter, saying "if we kept moving, they couldn't take her".
She told jurors: "If I had a crystal ball and I could see into the future what would happen to Victoria because of my exhaustion then of course I would have preferred to have made different choices, but we did what we could in the moment to keep her with her parents and to protect her".
Gordon elected not to give evidence in the trial, which continues.
'Abandoned'
The couple kept the birth of their fifth child secret and went on the run on January 5 2023 after their four other children were taken into care, the Old Bailey was previously told.
When their car burst into flames on a motorway near Bolton, they abandoned their belongings and travelled by taxi to Essex and London and on to the South Downs where they slept with the young girl in a flimsy tent, jurors heard.
Having carried the child in a Lidl bag during her short life, the baby was abandoned amid rubbish in the same bag after she died, it is alleged.
'Hiding'
Following a police search, the baby's body was found in a disused shed near Brighton following the couple's arrest on February 27 2023.
The prosecution has alleged the couple's actions - by exposing their baby to extreme cold in a tent - were grossly negligent and Victoria could have died from hypothermia or been smothered and suffocated.
In March, Marten's lawyer Francis Fitzgibbon KC told jurors that baby Victoria had been born in a cottage in Cumbria on Christmas Eve 2022 before her parents went on the run because they did not want her to be taken into care.
He told jurors: "By January 8, Ms Marten was stressed and exhausted. They went temporarily into hiding while deciding what to do next. Ms Marten, exhausted, fell asleep with her baby after breastfeeding. The consequence was, the baby died.
"We say this was not a case of hypothermia. We say, death was caused by Ms Marten falling asleep and compromising the baby's breathing and we say that is a tragic accident, something that could happen anywhere where an exhausted breastfeeding mother may fall asleep on her newborn baby.
"And then consumed by grief, still wishing to avoid the world, her existence was reduced to scavenging for food and living in appalling conditions and she was unwilling to let go of the remains of the baby despite the fact she died.
"What happened, was say, is not a crime but a terrible tragic accident."
On behalf of Gordon, John Femi-Ola KC told jurors earlier this year that baby Victoria was "well cared for, well loved and kept warm close to her mother".
He said: "The fact that when she was found she was in a onesie is not conclusive that is the only item of clothing she had."
And he disputed the baby was ever carried in a bag-for-life before she died, adding: "You will need to consider shock and grief after Victoria's death. They neglected themselves for weeks thereafter, but that is not an indication of how they cared for their child."
Mr Femi-Ola said that "co-sleeping" with a baby was "not a crime", and that the cause of Victoria's death remained "unascertained".
Earlier, prosecutor Tom Little KC asserted there were two possible ways the baby died - by exposure to the extreme cold or by smothering while co-sleeping while her parents.
He told jurors that the conditions the defendants lived in with their baby were "utterly reckless, utterly dangerous".
The background of social services' involvement with the family was important because the defendants had been warned "time and again" of the dangers, including of sleeping in a tent with a young child, he said.
Mr Little added: "They exposed her to the cold. They exposed her to the damp in winter conditions and they did so with woefully inadequate clothing.
"Any child that becomes hypothermic in those conditions, we say, must amount to a breach of duty of care. If death was caused by smothering or suffocation, one of the reasons for that must have been conditions in that tent.
"The second defendant (Marten) fell asleep with the baby underneath her jacket zipped up in that tent. If that is what occurred, it represents a breach of that duty of care by the parents because they were in that tent together.
"We say the risk of death by hypothermia or suffocation was obvious, but also it was a serious risk of death."
The prosecutor argued that the defendants' failure to report the child's death was an attempt to "hide potential evidence and cause of death".
