The jury in the trial of aristocrat Constance Marten has retired to consider their verdicts following three months of evidence at the Old Bailey.
Marten, 36, and her partner Mark Gordon, 49, have been accused of manslaughter after their daughter Victoria died while they were camping on the South Downs in wintry conditions last January.
In a bid to keep their baby after four previous children were taken into care, the couple had gone on the run and evaded police for nearly two months. Following their arrest, Victoria’s badly decomposed remains were found in a Lidl shopping bag in an allotment shed.
During her evidence, Marten told jurors she had intended to find someone to smuggle them abroad illegally, and claimed her daughter had died in her arms on 9 January after falling asleep in her jacket.
The couple deny charges of gross negligence manslaughter of Victoria between 4 January and 27 February last year, charges of perverting the course of justice by concealing the body, along with concealing the birth of a child, child cruelty, and allowing the death of a child.
