The runaway parents of a baby girl who died in their care said they considered cremating her body and “jumping in with her”.
Constance Marten and Mark Gordon were living in a tent on the run from social services when their newborn baby Victoria died at the beginning of last year.
Marten, giving evidence at the Old Bailey today, told the court she “did not accept” that her daughter was dead and considered saying “goodbye to life together”.
She said: “We were thinking about cremating her [baby Victoria].
“I spent time in India and saw a body being cremated so I knew it was easy to do.
“At that point Mark said we should jump in it with her and just call it quits. Say goodbye to life together.
“We had had enough by that point.”
Speaking tearfully about the death of her baby daughter, Marten said that Victoria died in her arms on January 9, 2023.
She said she woke up in the tent they were living in in Newhaven and found she “wasn’t alive”.
Marten said she and Gordon tried to resuscitate Victoria as they “didn’t accept she wasn’t alive”.
She said she held her daughter’s body for hours before wrapping her in a black headscarf and saying some “parting words”.
Marten said she was worried that the media and the press would “have a field day” following her daughter’s death.
The court heard that Marten and Gordon took the bus from Newhaven to Brighton on a number of occasions while carrying their baby daughter’s dead body in a Lidl bag for life.
The couple were at the centre of a national manhunt after going on the run from the North of England through Bolton, Liverpool and London before ending up in Sussex.
They are on trial accused of gross negligence manslaughter after baby Victoria’s body was found in a Lidl bag for life in an allotment in Hollingbury on March 1, 2023.
The couple were arrested on February 27 in Golf Drive, Brighton.
They are also charged with perverting the course of justice, concealing the birth of a child, causing or allowing the death of a child and child cruelty.
They deny all charges.
The trial at the Old Bailey continues.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article