Constance Marten case — I feel the police have some responsibility too

Hired help is no substitute for caring, loving parenting. It can work in conjunction with caring, loving parenting. But CM was clearly unable to provide that.
Very telling that her family thought the solution to this was to throw money at it.

@BungleWasBrill what do you think CM’s parents should have done?

Adults can be vulnerable.

I'm not saying she was necessarily, but it's shortsighted to think that only children are vulnerable. There are many vulnerable adults.

From what I've read in news articles her first childs removal was prompted by her affluent family's disapproval of her relationship and the removal was enforced when she fell out the window. Every child born afterwards was removed from birth - straight after labour. She never got much of a chance to be a mother before they were taken away. It must have been incredibly traumatic for her every time another child was taken immediately after birth. She was quite obviously doing everything she could to avoid that happening again and wanted a chance to be a mother. Also her involvement in the weird cult was orchestrated by her mother, who took her there on holiday and then conveniently left her naughty child behind with the religious kooks. Wealthy families don't ever really let their children grow up, there's always a level of control and entitlement coming from above. I know of a woman whose family took parental responsibility of her child in a private court case simply because they thought they could offer the child a more lavish lifestyle - more holidays, private schooling, tutors and private sports facilities. The woman, broken by the fact her grandmother was doing this, fell into a spiral of depression and walked away from the court case knowing she couldn't offer the same financial opportunities for her child. Then believing they were right (they were not! She's a wonderful mum). I see a lot of similarities here and do sympathise for Constance. Apart from the falling from a window and her partners criminal history I haven't read one thing that indicated her children should be removed - no drug or alcohol issues, no ss reports of inadequate housing, no domestic violence. The family didn't want her with him and that was the main reason it all started. She was eventually left to give birth in an air bnb in fear she would lose another child and had to flee to live in the wilderness to avoid the police manhunt. The police definitely hold some responsibility for the baby's death, so do her family and the social services.

Why do people keep saying she was vulnerable? She was a fully grown up adult woman, also with plenty of financial freedom to make different choices.

Listened to an interesting podcast earlier - that there was no physical or dna evidence of the rape, only his own confession when he 14 with no adult present, the women who accused him never mentioned an English accent. I imagine this is what he spun to her and she clearly believed it, and added to her her fear of the Authorities. Sad sad case that we will never know the truth about.

I know of a woman whose family took parental responsibility of her child in a private court case simply because they thought they could offer the child a more lavish lifestyle - more holidays, private schooling, tutors and private sports facilities.

Could someone with legal knowledge confirm if this could feasibly happen within the UK? It doesn't sound plausible to me. Surely there was more to it than that?

Listened to an interesting podcast earlier - that there was no physical or dna evidence of the rape, only his own confession when he 14 with no adult present, the women who accused him never mentioned an English accent. I imagine this is what he spun to her and she clearly believed it, and added to her her fear of the Authorities. Sad sad case that we will never know the truth about.

I feel I have insufficient vocabulary to adequately sum up what an utter, utter load of tripe this post is.

Do you write poor quality fiction for a living @Pancakesandcream33 ??

From what I've read in news articles her first childs removal was prompted by her affluent family's disapproval of her relationship and the removal was enforced when she fell out the window. Every child born afterwards was removed from birth - straight after labour. She never got much of a chance to be a mother before they were taken away. It must have been incredibly traumatic for her every time another child was taken immediately after birth. She was quite obviously doing everything she could to avoid that happening again and wanted a chance to be a mother. Also her involvement in the weird cult was orchestrated by her mother, who took her there on holiday and then conveniently left her naughty child behind with the religious kooks. Wealthy families don't ever really let their children grow up, there's always a level of control and entitlement coming from above. I know of a woman whose family took parental responsibility of her child in a private court case simply because they thought they could offer the child a more lavish lifestyle - more holidays, private schooling, tutors and private sports facilities. The woman, broken by the fact her grandmother was doing this, fell into a spiral of depression and walked away from the court case knowing she couldn't offer the same financial opportunities for her child. Then believing they were right (they were not! She's a wonderful mum). I see a lot of similarities here and do sympathise for Constance. Apart from the falling from a window and her partners criminal history I haven't read one thing that indicated her children should be removed - no drug or alcohol issues, no ss reports of inadequate housing, no domestic violence. The family didn't want her with him and that was the main reason it all started. She was eventually left to give birth in an air bnb in fear she would lose another child and had to flee to live in the wilderness to avoid the police manhunt. The police definitely hold some responsibility for the baby's death, so do her family and the social services.

Her first child was not removed because of her parents' disapproval of the relationship! Where did you get that nonsense from?

From what I've read in news articles her first childs removal was prompted by her affluent family's disapproval of her relationship and the removal was enforced when she fell out the window. Every child born afterwards was removed from birth - straight after labour. She never got much of a chance to be a mother before they were taken away. It must have been incredibly traumatic for her every time another child was taken immediately after birth. She was quite obviously doing everything she could to avoid that happening again and wanted a chance to be a mother. Also her involvement in the weird cult was orchestrated by her mother, who took her there on holiday and then conveniently left her naughty child behind with the religious kooks. Wealthy families don't ever really let their children grow up, there's always a level of control and entitlement coming from above. I know of a woman whose family took parental responsibility of her child in a private court case simply because they thought they could offer the child a more lavish lifestyle - more holidays, private schooling, tutors and private sports facilities. The woman, broken by the fact her grandmother was doing this, fell into a spiral of depression and walked away from the court case knowing she couldn't offer the same financial opportunities for her child. Then believing they were right (they were not! She's a wonderful mum). I see a lot of similarities here and do sympathise for Constance. Apart from the falling from a window and her partners criminal history I haven't read one thing that indicated her children should be removed - no drug or alcohol issues, no ss reports of inadequate housing, no domestic violence. The family didn't want her with him and that was the main reason it all started. She was eventually left to give birth in an air bnb in fear she would lose another child and had to flee to live in the wilderness to avoid the police manhunt. The police definitely hold some responsibility for the baby's death, so do her family and the social services.

'The trip abroad' Really? Have you read about the horror of what went on in TB Joshua's church?

And absolutely, what that poor little baby experienced is utterly devastating and traumatic.

As for the way people deal with trauma; everyone is an individual, everyone has a unique life experience and so everyone deals with things differently. As I have said repeatedly, I am not defending her actions.

The way people some posters are describing her as “vulnerable” or having a “vulnerable” past is bizarre. More like entitled, anti-social and selfish.

I find it intriguing how coming from extreme privilege and from severe deprivation can both fuck people up and lead to them making very unwise choices.

That’s actually a fair point. DS was born in December and spent a lot of time in a sling under my coat. I don’t think he had on much more than a babygro.

It does rather go to show how things can be taken out of context to sound awful when in fact they are not.