Cause of death of runaway aristocrat Constance Marten’s baby ‘still a mystery’
The cause of death of aristocrat Constance Marten’s baby remains a mystery, an inquest has heard.
Marten, 35, and her boyfriend Mark Gordon, 48, are charged with the manslaughter of baby Victoria, who was found dead in Brighton on March 1 after a two-day search.
The infant’s remains were discovered in a plastic bag in a locked shed at an overgrown allotment in the Hollingbury area of the East Sussex seaside city.
The grim discovery came after Marten and Gordon were arrested in Stanmer Villas in Brighton on February 27 following a nationwide search lasting nearly two months.
Joanne Andrews, assistant coroner for West Sussex, told an inquest into baby Victoria’s death that a post-mortem examination performed at Guy’s and St Thomas’s Hospital in London on March 3 was inconclusive.
No date of birth was confirmed, and Ms Andrews said the inquest has been suspended while police investigate the circumstances of her death.
‘The inquest will only be resumed if sufficient reason to do so,’ she told the hearing in Horsham.
Marten and Gordon were also charged with concealing a child’s birth and perverting the course of justice.
At the Old Bailey on Monday, it emerged they face new charges of child cruelty and causing or allowing the death of a child.
It is claimed they caused the baby’s death by their own ‘unlawful act’ or failed to ‘take such steps as could reasonably have been expected’ to protect her.
The alleged offences are said to have taken place between January 4 and February 27.
Marten, a pink and white floral print shirt, and Gordon, in a grey tracksuit, appeared from HMP Bronzefield and HMP Belmarsh respectively before the Recorder of London, Judge Mark Lucraft KC.
Judge Lucraft put a plea and case management hearing back from August 18 to September 22 and confirmed the provisional trial has been set for January 2 next year.
A further mention hearing was set for August 25.
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