In care, their four other children

CONSTANCE Marten and Mark Gordon were already well known to social services when they vanished with their newborn, the court heard yesterday.

The couple’s four other children had all been taken into care by the age of ten due to concerns about the pair’s ‘dangerous ways’, jurors were told.

In 2017 a national hospital alert was allegedly issued for Marten when concerned social workers could not locate the thenexpectant mother after she appeared at a hospital claiming to be living in a campervan parked nearby.

Weeks later, Marten is said to have given birth at a hospital in another part of the country where she lied about her name.

Tom Little, prosecuting, said: ‘The true identities of the couple were only ascertained after a social worker recalled the nationwide alert.

‘Marten said that they had thought that, if they posed as travellers, they might be given social housing. Marten said she was homeless and did not know how she would meet the needs of her baby.’

Social workers later located the family living in a festival-style tent, which was allegedly bowed under the weight of rain, smelled stale and had bottles of urine at the entrance.

In 2021, when she became pregnant again, Marten is said to have avoided appointments because she did not want social services to be ‘draconian’ and take the baby away. When the unnamed child was born, Marten left hospital without the child, the court heard.

Marten claimed that she and Gordon were ‘naturalists’ and did not agree with any medical intervention with their children, it was said. By 2022 all of their children had been taken into care.