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

[Siff]

I know Constance Marten and her partner made dangerous and illegal choices, and I’m not excusing that — a baby died and that’s heartbreaking. But I can’t stop thinking about the way the case was handled and whether the police have some responsibility in how things unfolded.

As a mum of four who’s struggled mentally after birth, I keep thinking: if I had just given birth, was vulnerable, and felt like the whole world was hunting me down — would I have thought clearly? Probably not. The media coverage was intense, and the police were everywhere. The pressure must have been overwhelming.

I honestly believe the fear created by the police operation pushed them into making more and more desperate and risky decisions to stay hidden. It wasn’t just a search — it felt like a witch hunt. No safeguarding, no attempt to reach her as a vulnerable mother, just a hard push to capture and punish.

I think that approach had consequences. The police must take some responsibility for creating the kind of fear and pressure that led to this tragedy. The way they went about it likely made things worse — not better — for the baby.

It’s easy to say she was selfish or unstable, but mental health in the postnatal period is fragile. People don’t always think rationally when terrified. I just wish there had been more humanity in how it was all handled.
Anyone else feel the same?

I hope that they are locked up for a very long time, from the reports it does seem she changed after being part of a cult like church in Africa, however the harm they both caused to their children who were placed in care and their 5th child (the baby found in the bag) is just awful. Their other four children will suffer and no doubt have issues growing up, takes a hard-hearted parent to not care and according to the reports, she Constance didn't seem to care about her children. I hope all of their children do somehow manage to live happy and fulfilling lives.

I think they might have had more of an opportunity to engage that way with her had she told anyone about being pregnant with Victoria. According to the reporting, had they not found a placenta in a burning car, they wouldn’t have known Victoria even existed. So guess it was sort of panic-stations after that, especially against the backdrop of 4 previously removed children.

its a hard one to balance. Undoubtedly she wasn’t well, and that’s of course not her fault. It never is in any case, but especially her upbringing just seemed a bit lacking in the emotional dept. Her parents probably have a lot to answer for. But at what stage do you put a parents’s mental health/ struggles to one side and focus on reducing harm to the child?

I did find reading about both of their behaviour in court quite upsetting, though. Again, she’s not well, but the sort of indignation, arrogance, lack of remorse shown was quite jarring. If my actions had lead to the death of my daughter in the way hers and her partners have, I’m not sure I’d want to keep on living, let alone defend myself and flirt with my co-defendent.

yeah not well=psychotic

Absolutely and they could have given up their own jackets to protect baby Victoria from the elements.

Have you any idea how much time services spend trying to keep violent men away from vulnerable women, and how much effort some women go to hiding the fact that the violent man is back again.

She chose repeatedly to be with him, in the face of extensive support. And yes trauma and poor mental health will play its part but at some point the children’s safety needs to come first. It’s incredibly difficult to remove children. Social work need to evidence there’s no other way to keep them safe but to remove them. How many chances do you give a woman while her children are being neglected and exposed to violence.

As far as I'm aware, adopted children in the UK usually have letterbox contact with their birth parents. Frequent contact would be in the parents' best interests, not the child's.

Police action (late 2022/early 2023) was informed by full knowledge of what Gordon and Marten had been up to in the past few years - we (the public) have only had this knowledge since yesterday.

Deeply insecure, often unfit living situation, repeated refusal to engage with Social Services and accept assistance offered, repeated going off radar, violence (the one extreme example we know of didn't come from nowhere), failure to maintain contact when the children were in care, four+ years of hearings in the Family Court...

A FC Judgment issued in January 2022 stated that, despite flashes of seeing (in contact visits) what could have been a nurturing family environment, the parents always put themselves, and their baseless battle against the "authorities" first, and that there was a real and high probability that the children would be harmed by future violence and neglect within the home. This is the reason for the adoption order for the four children. So, no, the Police response when looking for the couple and their new-born child was not heavy-handed.

One point that's not been touched on, in any of the reporting from 2023 on, is that Marten had five children in five years, in at best highly unstable and very stressful circumstances. This is context and by no means an excuse, but it must have fed into her state of mind, decision-making ability and behaviour.

I’m glad this thread exists as it has flushed out something I find astonishing- the extent to which many people still make excuses for the appalling, deplorable, monstrous behaviour of some parents- provided those parents are female. ‘Vulnerable’, ‘coerced’, ‘poor choices’, ‘fragile’ etc.

How many times has this attitude- one that reflects sexist assumptions about agency- resulted in the death or suffering of a child? Innumerable times I would imagine.

Children suffer and die because of the selfish, vain, narcissistic, cruel, irresponsible behaviour of some mothers. To describe those mothers as ‘vulnerable’ is an abuse of the word. Children come first. Not parents. Excessive sympathy for mothers - as demonstrated in the idea that the police were ‘heavy handed’ in their treatment of poor vulnerable CM- runs the risk of blunting the response of society to child abuse & endangerment. It is deplorable.

He spent the initial weeks of their first baby's life in Cardiff prison, while Marten stayed with families in a series of mother and baby placements.
When Gordon was released, Marten travelled to visit him in London, leaving the newborn behind for 17 hours.

From the BBC news website.

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.

No, four children already in care what else were they supposed to do.

The children need to be removed for their own safety. It's not as though they can get a job and move out. They're trapped. Of course the mother should be supported, but sadly there are plenty of mothers out there who will prioritise their love life over their children's safety every time, no matter how much support they've been given.

Completely agree. I also don’t agree with trying to keep a mother and baby together for as long as possible because she gave birth to it. Sometimes the best thing is to remove that child far, far sooner to limit the damage upon a defenceless baby/babies.

This narrative that she was scared and vulnerable. The comments from the judge say otherwise. She was the more ‘dominant personality’ and appeared to have main character energy all through the retrial which she tried to sabotage at various points and displayed appalling behaviour.

Those poor children. Their care and welfare didn’t matter to that couple one bit. One developed a stammer due to their repeated no shows at contact. I hope they are with loving families now.

She chose him repeatedly over her children - clearly evidenced in all the information from the different trials.
Why are you so determined to spout the mantra that the children should not have been removed? As those working in safeguarding have repeatedly pointed out, the threshold for removing children is incredibly high. Marten was complicit in the death of the baby because of her determination to stay with him rather than prioritise the safety of her baby.

Unbelievable that anyone is blaming the authorities for the terrible death of this baby - it's solely down to the parents.

She wasn't doing everything she could at all. Literally the only thing she had to do was leave the man.

@ZoeCM i don’t think we can say with absolute certainty what happens in every case. Through a rightful need to be mindful of privacy things are very closed and I do think that’s partly why there is at least some suspicion relating to actions in these cases.

The two of them behaved badly in court as to disrupt both trials as much as they could. Couldn’t even be bothered turning up for the parental contact, leaving the eldest child developing a stammer and telling nursery staff mummy and daddy cancelled again. That’s causing trauma to those poor children.

The two of them live in a world of delusion. She left a baby on the ward and refused a covid test to return after a day or so. She could only put her relationship first. Though once she offered to leave MG the judge didn’t believe she would stick to it.

They were given so much but the two of them think they are above everyone else.

“She was quite obviously doing everything she could to avoid that happening again and wanted a chance to be a mother“

I can’t find this in the press, can you share everything she was doing to avoid a child being taken into care/an article?

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.

Social workers don’t recommend removal because an affluent family asks for it. There’s a long process of assessment and support, extensive evidence from multiple disciplines required to get to court and then the removal is ordered by court only if that evidence stands up. Each child’s assessment is an individual one taking account of what’s changed since the last removal. It’s very, very difficult to remove a child, much less to remove 4.

The assessment and decision making around permanence and adoption is a separate one to removing a child and, again, is multi disciplinary and heavily examined.

We don’t owe women the “chance to be a mother”, we owe children safety and security.

You only need to look at the way baby Victoria was manhandled, an under dressed newborn, in January UK weather.

In contrast to her well dressed parents.

And know Victoria’s body was dumped in with rubbish , in a bag , while her parents ran around the country avoiding the police and social services. To know exactly what kind of mother she was 🙄

How about some evidence for your claims in this awful post? I'd suggest reading the details from the court cases as they completely contradict your claims.

There are literally none so blind as those who will not see. And a fair few of them appear to be posting on here.

You haven’t read much then, she was living in squalor and in a tent surrounded by bottles of urine with her first child, she abandoned her children to go back to him, if it was just a case of her rich family wanting her children removed she could’ve cut ties with them and used her trust fund money to buy a house and lived like a normal person, and shown SS that she could look after them.

The one that sticks in my head is Peter Connelly (Baby P). Social services were so focused on handling the mother with kid gloves that Peter ended up dead at seventeen months despite numerous visits. When the social workers started asking questions about Peter's injuries, she would bring up how difficult her own childhood had been and how well she was doing in comparison to her own parents. The social workers would then agree and redirect the conversation elsewhere. Social services' emphasis on supporting the mother ended up killing Peter. She worked out how to manipulate them into reassuring her about her parenting skills when really they should have been focusing on the baby's well-being.