Constance Marten and Mark Gordon Case #5

[Haveyouanywool]

There’s a difference between living off grid (which can mean different things to different people) and being on the run in winter, in an inadequate tent with no heating, minimal food and no required medical attention. That’s just plain reckless.
Not everyone who lives of grid is antiestablishment.
ETA: I’m more of a ‘good life’ grow your own, on a budget, person.
The irony is she had the money to go all small holding, rural idyll type but still have the luxury of, really, being able to have all the extras she liked. But no…lived in squalor.

 

[euphoria99]

It’s actually so shit for the jury as well who are giving up time for this

 

[pommobear]

What comments do you mean? It feels like you’re describing a totally different thread to the ones I’ve been reading!

Yeah I have to agree with this, I'm really confused by this post.

Posters are trying to delve into their psyche, there's nothing wrong with that. People have done that with the most evil serial killers known to mankind. Doesn't mean they're excusing what they did.

 

[lampielooloo]

---

Less callous is still not the same as kind.

Yes you have pointed that out previously, and I clarified my thought process.

 

[Allmyownopinion]

Still blows my mind that they had child “I” who they thought so little of they abandoned at the hospital as recently as 2021/22, didn’t so much as glance back at that child & the other 3 who had to be taken into state care due to severe neglect, then go on to do it all again with Victoria & they literally could not give a shit about any 5 of them, just disposable, forgettable items! I hope the surviving 4 are now loved & adored by their new families.

 

[neroli]

This has been my take since they found her. I was in the minority then, and I’m sure we are still now - which I do understand - but it’s absolutely not a clear cut ‘fuck the authorities’. They did want their baby, what they did not understand was that they were unable to give her the best care.

They were unwilling to give her a very basic level of care yet were intellectually capable of leading the authorities a merry dance all over the country. The baby was just an expendable possession in their power game.

 

[Yano]

She's filling up a plastic bottle with fuel and the person working authorised the pump whaaat?

 

[MrsDimSum]

she sounds drunk! And daddy bear is just gross!!

Daddy Bear - that man is no fucking Daddy. He’s an animal I’m absolutely sickened and him munching down on crisps and questioning what the big deal about the baby was

 

[InTheDollsHouse]

Right, I don’t want to be accused (again) of policing and I do realise this post might stray into that territory, but…

The original question about education / adult learning / US prison system / opportunities after has been asked and answered. One poster is (I think) feeling like responses are a dig at them.

Whether they are or not, I know that feels shit. So I’m asking if we could all move on.

The thread has been flowing nicely the last couple of days and it would be a shame if we lost that

 

[heretoreaditall2019]

Honestly no one is doing that. It’s more “how the fuck did it come to this?” People are trying to figure out. It’s such an unusual situation

This is really well said thank you! Ultimately we’re just sat here mithering over the scraps of info from the (sloppy!) journalists who are reporting on the case, piecing it together/questioning it and layering on lived experiences and personal opinion, it’s quite a nice chat by and large? No one is going to agree on 100% of the things 100% of the time, we can all scroll past the bits we don’t like and as others have pointed out we can also hit the ignore button too!

Ngl I’m conscious @InTheDollsHouse has received a lot of flack though. Sending love - I really enjoy reading your contributions

 

[Aberscot]

Omg reading how the baby was found, what a pair of disgusting humans, no dignity in death for poor baby Victoria.
Stuffed in a bag full of rubbish. If they wanted to keep her body near them why the hell all the rubbish.
How can they both sit there pleading not guilty when show Bodycam of they way she was found.

PC Ralph told the court the bag was filled with rubbish but he noticed two newborn nappies near the top of it.
He told the court about the contents of the bag, which he and PC Britto emptied.
He said: "There was a pink balled up bloody blanket. Underneath that there was loads of rubbish, cans, bottles, leaves."

 

[Asterix]

What they did was abhorrent. I’ve handled an injured pigeon with more care than Constance did that poor baby - and I can’t stand pigeons.

Knowing she’s an educated, wealthy woman makes this all the more egregious than the usual economically and intellectually lacking SS-dodger stereotype. I don’t think it’s excusing or minimising their actions - cos there really are no mitigations for this shit - to be fascinated by the psychology that led to this awful outcome.

 

[InTheDollsHouse]

The witness says they came out of the bushes.

The witness that also snuck (her word) away from ramblers.

Why was everyone sneaking places? Also can’t help but laugh that the witness is called Ms Hidden.

 

[Mokie]

I’ve just watched the footage on ITV captured by the bodycam worn by police. Her tiny body was in the bottom of bag littered with beer cans and other rubbish. Absolute scum. I hope the police officers who found her are ok. This will never leave them. I hope CM and MG have the book thrown at them.

 

[sebanna]

I don't know where they would have got a camping stove or barbecue from, they didn't buy them from Argos.

Putting yourself in CM's shoes, you have a tiny baby without a snowsuit in a freezing tent. You would need to either cuddle up from warmth which would risk the baby being suffocated or try to heat the tent risking CO poisonings. Over time the baby probably became weak through a possible lack of food and being too cold.

We will never know if she was deliberately killed but the pathologist found no broken bones. Looking at the environment she was living in I think it was impossible for her to survive longterm.

 

[Allmyownopinion]

I was thinking about the hospital. It likely is that she just wanted to go and see MG, but I wonder if the hospital had discharged her but not the baby, so she left overnight and then refused to Covid test.

Makes absolutely none of it any better, but why on earth would she leave without the baby when she knew he or she was likely to be removed.

The court read out made it clear that wasn’t the case, she was leaving her baby at the hospital deliberately & the nurses told her that doing so would result in it being recorded as child abandonment if she left the hospital without her child. She was fully informed but still chose to leave it there alone. Unforgivable. Going back the next day was just a defiant tantrum to try & make it look like they wouldn’t give her baby back; no you purposely left it there!

 

[TenerifeTigger]

I've been following this thread and the trial a bit. The way that poor baby was found is fucking inhumane.

My old neighbour lost her baby through sids and the police made a mistake and woke my partner up as they had wrong flat and when he phoned me at 5am (I was nightshift) I could hear her screaming in the background then they moved and never came back to the flat, that's how I expect someone who just lost a baby to react. Not to put it in a bag with other rubbish.

It also made me very paranoid when I had my 2nd and I had breathing pads etc under her. Even now she's nearly 3 I still panic. She was in my room till over 2. My oldest however was in her own room with a monitor at 6 months.

 

[MavisBeacon]

I agree with this. They could have just let her be taken away by social services and carried on living in relative comfort themselves with no criminal charges if they'd really not given a shit about her.

Clearly they were, and are, dreadful, neglectful parents but I think they genuinely believed, however warped and unbelievable it may seem to us, they were keeping their daughter away from those who wanted to harm her.

I respect that people see them as plain evil and selfish with nothing more to it but IMO their mindset is a bit more complex.

And that should NOT be conflated as me thinking they should get a more lenient sentence. They deserve whatever is coming to them.

Agree. Seeking to understand is not the same as seeking to excuse.
Ultimately I don't think we'll ever fully know what was going on in their minds, or the set of circumstances and choices that led to the point of their arrest. But it's human nature to seek to explain what seems inexplicable.

 

[Haveyouanywool]

My opinion has always been that she is still mentally scarred from the cult. The dissociation, detachment and emotional numbness is a huge symptom of PTSD.

I’m absolutely not excusing what she’s done, or saying that it’s even a factor for consideration in sentencing - but it is likely to be something that has negatively affected and shaped her and so may have been part of why she seems so cold hearted. She is emotionally not there.

My opinion is she is an arrogant, haughty, emotionless c*** who is lying and fabricating stories in an effort to save her own sorry arse.
She knows her baby is dead but refuses to answer the police’s pleadings for information, instead disdainfully trying to tell them how to do their job.
The dog handler alludes to the fact the baby/body may be damaged during a search…nothing in way of response from her.
Complete cunts.
ETA: I watched the BBC programmes on the Cult. Seems they initially love bombed Westerners with praise and adulation. Wonder why CM was attracted to it.

 

[Emsie]

“She had trauma” “She had PTSD” “She loved Victoria in her own way just couldn’t show it right” “She had a bad childhood in boarding school” “Trauma from losing her other children”

It's not to excuse her. It's to understand it. Look you can disagree and please do share your thoughts but let's not mock other people's because they don't agree with you. It's giving childish.
We're all on a gossip thread, gossiping.