Inside baby killer Constance Marten's dark spiral from aristocracy to bin scavenging

Daily Mirror

5 days ago

Constance Marten, who has this week been found guilty of manslaughter, has close links to the Royal Family, while her aristocratic family's former estate featured in a period drama starring Gwyneth Paltrow
Constance Marten's estranged father, Napier, turned his back on his £115 million fortune after he had an 'awakening', seeking a very different life to the privileged one he was born into.
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His daughter, too, would take a very different road from the one expected of her, which would ultimately lead to a dock at the Old Bailey, following a harrowing chain of events.
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Aristocrat Marten and her boyfriend Mark Gordon, who stood accused of killing their newborn baby daughter Victoria, were this week found guilty of manslaughter.
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Marten, 38, and Gordon, 49, took tiny Victoria on the run in January last year to prevent her being taken away by social services, the court heard. The couple, whose four other children were taken into care, spent weeks living off-grid in the height of winter, with Victoria's body later found in a Lidl carrier bag in a disused shed.
The couple were found to be repeatedly disruptive in the courtroom, with Birmingham-born Gordon even calling upon "compassionate and merciful" King Charles to issue a royal pardon. He begged: "I ask the King in his mercy and those who work for him to help me."
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As baffling as such a plea may sound to outsiders, privately educated heiress Marten enjoyed an upbringing not so very far removed from those who live out their days behind palace walls.
Here we take a look at Marten's wealthy aristocratic background with historical ties to the royal family and why her father left his family and his huge fortune for a new life abroad.
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Marten was born in 1986, the eldest of four children welcomed by Napier and his wife, Virginie De Selliers, daughter of the Marchesa d'Ayala-Valva. She grew up with her brothers on the 5,000-acre Crichel estate in Dorset, where the former Tatler It-girl recalled enjoying "naked picnics, siestas amid [hay bales], and tractor scoops".
The incredible Georgian property has featured in period dramas, including the 1996 adaptation of Jane Austen's Emma, starring Gwyneth Paltrow.
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Napier, who was a page to the late Queen Elizabeth II, was heir to a £115million fortune but left his family and his inheritance behind when he travelled to Australia in 1996 after having an 'awakening'.
According to the Daily Mail, he experienced an "epiphany" over his materialistic life, shaved his head and lived in a lorry before training in head massage.
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Napier reportedly went whale watching and found it so emotionally charged that he cried "almost non-stop" for a week. He is also said to have had an out-of-body experience while standing with a group of Aboriginal people on a clifftop.
Marten was nine when her father went to Australia. He left Crichel to her brother Maximilian, and it stayed in the family until 2013, when it was bought by American billionaire Richard Chilton. Eton-educated Napier later returned to the UK to work as a tree surgeon alongside his son Tobias.
Napier was the fourth child of Mary Anna Marten and George Marten. Mary was the goddaughter of the late Queen Mother and a trustee of the British Museum. She attended the Brownies at Buckingham Palace with Princess Margaret and inherited Crichel when her father died during the Second World War.
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Marten's grandfather was a lieutenant commander in the Royal Navy and was an equerry to George VI. Their wedding in 1949 was attended by George VI, the Queen Mother, and Princess Margaret.
Marten's mother, Virginie de Selliers, and Napier divorced after he left for Australia, and she is believed to have remarried. She is a psychotherapist specialising in trauma, family therapy and grief, with private practices in London. In February 2023, while Constance was still missing, she wrote a letter to her, appealing for her to return and offering her support.
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She wrote: "You have made choices in your personal adult life which have proven to be challenging, however, I respect them. I know that you want to keep your precious newborn child at all costs.
"With all that you have gone through, this baby cannot be removed from you, but instead needs looking after in a kind and warm environment.
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"I want to help you and my grandchild. You deserve the opportunity to build a new life, establish a stable family and enjoy the same freedoms that most of us have.
"Constance, I will do what I can to stand alongside you and my grandchild. You are not alone in this situation. We will support you in whatever way we can."
By the time of her arrest in 2023, Marten was scavenging in bins for food, her off-grid life a far cry from the luxuries she'd once enjoyed. After completing her studies at the £30,000-a-year St Mary's Shaftesbury, Marten went on to achieve a 2:1 degree in Arabic and Middle Eastern studies at the University of Leeds, which saw her spend a year abroad in Cairo.
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An interview given to the society publication Tatler in 2008 sheds light on how the heiress spent her days. Then, just 18, the "babe of the month" opened up about the 'best party' she'd attended, revealing: "Viscount Cranbourne's party in Dorset – the theme was the Feast of Bacchus. There was a gambling tent and bunches of grapes hanging from the wall. It was like a debauched feast from ancient Greece."
An avid traveller, Marten, or 'Toots' as she was known to posh pals, spent time in India, Nepal, Uganda and South America, and, at 19, also spent several months living at a Christian cult in Nigeria, which proved to be an unsettling ordeal.
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For a while, it seemed that ambitious Marten had a bright future ahead of her. After training in journalism, Marten worked as a researcher for Al Jazeera and also interned at the Daily Mail. She then moved to Essex, where she studied drama at the East 15 Acting School.
As reported by The Independent, a drama friend recalled: "She was just beautiful, full of life, full of kindness . . . and she was very, very talented."
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However, everything changed in 2016 when Marten dropped out of the course. By this point, she was already involved in a relationship with Gordon, whom she'd met in a Tottenham incense shop in 2014. Two years later, they were married, in an unofficial ceremony held in Peru.
As reported by the Mail Online, sources claim Marten's parents hold "odious creep" Gordon responsible for the grim fate that befell their daughter and grandchildren, describing their meeting as a "cliff edge" moment.
Referring to Gordon as a "controlling predator", the source alleged: "Constance was the most beautiful, fun, lovely girl you could imagine. She was clearly quite a catch for him, and he clearly got his claws into her.
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"She has had the money and the wherewithal to settle down to family life like anyone else. Instead, she has preferred what is effectively a life on the run."
However, during her trials, Marten gave a different account of her downfall, claiming her family had cut off her funds and hired private detectives to track her and Gordon.
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She stated: "I had to escape my family because my family are extremely oppressive and bigoted and they wouldn't allow me to have children with my husband. They'll do anything to erase that child from the family line, which is what they ended up doing."
BBC News reports that, at the time police were looking for her and Gordon, Marten had more than £19,000 in her bank account, having received regular payments from the Sturt Family Trust via Hoares Bank between September 2022 to mid-January 2023, totalling £47,886.
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Marten and Gordon, of no fixed address, both denied manslaughter by gross negligence of their daughter Victoria between January 4 and February 27, 2023. The defendants also denied perverting the course of justice, concealing the birth of a child, child cruelty, and causing or allowing the death of a child.
A first jury was discharged after being unable to reach a verdict on the charges of manslaughter by gross negligence and causing or allowing the death of a child. But they found both Marten and Gordon guilty of child cruelty, perverting the course of justice and concealing the birth of a child. The defendants then lost an appeal against these convictions.
They will now be sentenced on September 15.