An abandoned car burning on the side of the highway, images from security cameras and pink ear muffs. These are just some of the clues that are helping the British Police to reconstruct the disappearance of the young aristocrat Constance Marten, her partner, Mark Gordon, a convicted sex offender, and their newborn baby, in a case that has shocked the world. United Kingdom.
The investigation dates back to January 5, when the couple, along with the minor, were traveling in their car on the highway near the English town of Bolton. After suffering a breakdown, the family left the vehicle - bought just six days earlier - on the shoulder and fled on foot before taking a taxi to Liverpool. Around seven in the evening, the Police found the car on fire, with most of the family's belongings burned. The next day, they traveled the 267 miles that separate the city of the Beatles from Essex County before reaching the capital, dodging authorities at all times and covering their faces with masks and scarves. The game of cat and mouse lasted for seven weeks as they tried to find the family, concerned for the baby's well-being, before Marten and Gordon were tracked down and arrested in Brighton on Monday.
There are indications that Marten, 35 years old and heiress to a fortune of almost 130 million euros, had given birth without medical assistance to the child, whose sex is still unknown, in the car in which they were traveling, after detectives revealed that placenta and blood had been found in it. There are also indications that the family was living outdoors during that time, after Gordon, 48, was caught on security cameras after buying a tent, two sleeping bags and two pillows in south-east London. on January 7.
The last time the family was seen before their arrest was during the early hours of January 8, when they arrived at the port of Newhaven, in the south of the country, and entered nearby fields with their belongings.
In the days that followed, Metropolitan Police Superintendent Lewis Basford made several appeals to the couple, insisting that they "do not want to disrupt their family life". In a statement, the Chief Inspector of Essex Police said that "this search is primarily aimed at ensuring the well-being of the baby", while acknowledging that the sub-zero temperatures facing the UK could pose a "serious risk" to the child's health.
So how did Marten, whose father was a page to Elizabeth II, go from gracing the pages of Britain's oldest magazine, Tatler, to eloping with a man who, after robbing and raping a woman as a teenager, spent 20 years in prison? in Florida?
Speaking to The Independent, Marten's father, Napier, has pointed to a rift that began when Constance met Gordon at East 15 acting school in 2016, taking her away from her family to lead "an itinerant life". She had gone from enjoying a life of luxury, growing up on the Crichel House estate and studying at a private institute, to not paying rent and being evicted from the house she shared with Gordon in London. As detailed by The Guardian, the couple began living as nomads last September, moving between Airbnb homes and paying their expenses in cash.
And it was at an ATM that a Brighton resident saw the couple on Monday withdrawing money. Sussex Police were alerted, who arrested the couple for alleged child neglect. They were re-arrested Tuesday on suspicion of gross negligence homicide after refusing to release any details about the baby or its whereabouts. A search against time was launched to find the minor, with more than 200 police officers deployed to search a 230-square-kilometre area, along with dozens of neighbors. Late yesterday, Basford stated that the body of a baby had been found near where Marten and Gordon were arrested, but it is not known if it is his son.
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