GUILTY UK - Constance Marten & Mark Gordon charged in death of baby Victoria, GUILTY on all counts incl retrial on manslaughter, 5 Jan 2023 #9

[Deleted member 367833]

What sort of order issued by a British court would be enforceable in the Republic of Ireland, given that it's an entirely separate jurisdiction?

That's what I was wondering. I can't see that anything other than an arrest warrant plus an order by an Irish court to go ahead with its execution after the British authorities had applied for one would force a person's return.

 

[Deleted member 367833]

"Gordon said "he had to read the criminal law text Archbold Criminal Pleading, Evidence and Practice.

The judge retorted: 'Providing you with a copy of Archbold is not going to help you very much, although as the editor I would be very keen for the sales increase – it is actually a book which covers the whole of criminal law. It's a book of 3,500 pages. How much is going to help you?

'You need a law degree. What do you want me to do, adjourn for three years while you do a law degree?' "

Somewhat disappointing that the judge (or any person in charge of the proceedings in a room) could not resist being sarcastic, and he should know that needing to read the relevant part of a document isn't the same as needing to read it all.

He also seems to imply that Mark Gordon wouldn't understand what he read.

How Constance Marten and Mark Gordon tried to 'sabotage' their trial

The conditions were 'freezing', the food 'inadequate' and the days long, sometimes 19 hours with little or no rest.

www.dailymail.co.uk

 

[Rusty Braincells]

One of her own lawyers clearly thought she was mentally ill -

"Meanwhile, Marten refused to be cross examined by the prosecutor, calling him 'diabolical', to the concern of her own lawyer, who suggested she was 'not fit to give evidence' and 'needed to see a psychiatrist'.

Marten shouted back: 'I will refuse to see a psychiatrist. I want to give evidence,' before less than 30 seconds later declaring: 'I don't want to give evidence.'"

How Constance Marten and Mark Gordon tried to 'sabotage' their trial

The conditions were 'freezing', the food 'inadequate' and the days long, sometimes 19 hours with little or no rest.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Not definitive evidence either, again the subjective opinion of a lawyer, who is not a mental health professional. A lawyer recommending that their client see a psychiatrist may be protecting the client’s interests and/or discharging their duty to the court, but they might be wrong or reacting in the moment.

 

[Skigh]

According to Sky News she stayed in Ireland" until a court order in December 2019 forced her to return" and then "in January 2020, two children were taken into care".

Why did Constance Marten and Mark Gordon go on the run? Why their older children went into care - and why they thought it would happen again

Constance Marten said she went on the run because there was "no way I was going to part with my child". With their four older children in care, would baby Victoria have been removed? Sky News looks at the couple's motivations and how the family court system works.

news.sky.com

It seems this was related to Napier Marten's application for a court wardship. According to Sky "When this application was granted, it meant Marten had to return from Ireland."

She was actively hiding from social services and I am prone to think one of the 'experts ' she sought advice from was someone who was part of a group similar to that which has been demonstrating outside the Old Bailey and even with all the evidence that is now coming out probably think she was safe with babies.


From the Sky News article:
An interim care order was made. This can only be issued if a child has suffered or is at risk of suffering significant harm, and gives the local authority shared parental responsibility so it can make decisions about the child's welfare and where they live.

Marten and her child were placed in several temporary mother and baby placements - the first in a series of care interventions throughout her children's lives.

She sought advice from an "expert" in evading social services about how to keep her children after a domestic violence incident between her and Gordon in 2019.

The expert told her to flee to Ireland, and she stayed there until a court order in December 2019 forced her to return. In January 2020, two children were taken into care, and an emergency protection order was made when their third child was born a few months later.

 

[Legally Bland]

Both the UK and Ireland are signatories to this:

Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[Rusty Braincells]

The BBC says CM was “persuaded” to return from Ireland rather than forced. Court papers reveal Constance Marten and Mark Gordon’s failures as parents

It is possible to enforce UK orders in the Irish courts, including family court judgements. It is more complicated since Brexit, but can be done. But Ireland is a “friendly” jurisdiction which will likely cooperate with British authorities’ requests on matters of child safety, and two kids with a British woman in a hotel who British social services have concerns about, the Irish authorities may well have been willing to open an investigation themselves if CM did not bring the kids back, could well have been the “persuasion.”

 

[jackal67]

I think that's a very subjective and symplistic view of two people who were clearly not operating on remotely full cylinders for the entirety of their effed-up relationship.

That's not me making excuses for either of them, that's me just objectively looking, in the light of the new info available to us post-verdict, at the clearly delusional mess the pair of them were from the off, and how and why they ended up where they currently are.

Its my opinion you dont have to agree with it. There are some nasty selfish individuals in this world who simply dont care about their kids and are terrible parents MOO

 

[Anxala]

What sort of order issued by a British court would be enforceable in the Republic of Ireland, given that it's an entirely separate jurisdiction?

Do we know what part of Ireland they went to? If the 6 counties (ie. Northern Ireland), then yes, that would be within British jurisdiction.

 

[Deleted member 367833]

Not definitive evidence either, again the subjective opinion of a lawyer, who is not a mental health professional. A lawyer recommending that their client see a psychiatrist may be protecting the client’s interests and/or discharging their duty to the court, but they might be wrong or reacting in the moment.

"I want to give evidence" ... "I don't want to give evidence" sounds like either

1. a slip of the tongue under stress, followed by self-correction, or
2. an insistence that she wanted to give relevant evidence rather than answer questions such as "Don't you think what you did was despicable?", followed by the thought that perhaps her choice of words hadn't made her position clear,

rather than someone going nuts and contradicting themselves. To judge from the reports, the context seems as though it was pretty clear to everyone that she didn't want to answer any more questions from the prosecuting counsel, because she thought his most recent question ("despicable") was a disgrace ("diabolical").

If certain newspapers go any further, they will be wheeling out the word "hysterical" next.

 

[Yellowbelly]

Do we know what part of Ireland they went to? If the 6 counties, then yes, that would be within British jurisdiction.

If she fled to Ireland in order to avoid British social services, and ended up in Northern Ireland, she's just as stupid as Mark Gordon is!

 

[DianaWW]

‘Paranoid about her family tracking her down, she used cash to rent a rural cottage near Dublin. The plan was for Gordon to join her later, but the courts seized his passport, meaning he was unable to travel. Reluctantly Marten returned to Britain to reunite with him, and in May 2020 gave birth to her third child.’

Access Restricted

 

[Yellowbelly]

‘Paranoid about her family tracking her down, she used cash to rent a rural cottage near Dublin. The plan was for Gordon to join her later, but the courts seized his passport, meaning he was unable to travel. Reluctantly Marten returned to Britain to reunite with him, and in May 2020 gave birth to her third child.’

Access Restricted

Seizing his passport wouldn't have prevented him from travelling from the UK to Ireland (Republic or Northern), as you don't need one to make that journey as a British citizen. The ferries and airlines do ask for some form of photo ID, though.

Entry requirements - Ireland travel advice

FCDO travel advice for Ireland. Includes safety and security, insurance, entry requirements and legal differences.

www.gov.uk

 

[Deleted member 367833]

Is the Tegrelaugh right to say MG was jailed for life in the USA in his early teens and that his sentence was later reduced to 40 years? I thought he got 40 years and then was released and deported after 20.

https://archive.ph/JD4cf

They also say

"Marten remained at boarding school. Like many teenagers she sometimes had a bumpy relationship with her mother and stepfather, but friends of the family insist it was mainly about trivial matters."

"Friends of" is often journalese for " ".

No attempt is made in that article to acknowledge the effect on children of being put by their parents into residential institutions away from their parents for most of each year - an experience that is not familiar to most children.

 

[Alyce]

My mummy and daddy cancelled again,’ their children told staff. One had a nightmare that monsters had taken their parents away, while another began bed-wetting and developed a stammer.

The hearings were once again beset by delays and problems. On the first day of the one in January 2022, the pair claimed to have Covid – sending in photos of positive lateral flow tests and only attending remotely.

The documents also reveal that Marten’s mother, Virginie de Selliers, had offered to be a potential carer for the two older children, saying that she ‘felt desperately sad for her daughter and the children’.
But having been given access to all the files, she then withdrew her offer. Her lawyer told the court of her reasoning: ‘She saw the relationship between the parents as an enmeshed and abusive one, and was concerned that if any of the children were placed with her she would not be able safely to care for them.’

From lady to tramp: £2.4m Constance Marten ended up scavenging in bins

From the dock of the Old Bailey, Constance Marten repeatedly insisted that she and Mark Gordon were good parents. But the official record of what actually happened paints a very different picture...

www.dailymail.co.uk

 

[DianaWW]

Seizing his passport wouldn't have prevented him from travelling from the UK to Ireland (Republic or Northern), as you don't need one to make that journey as a British citizen. The ferries and airlines do ask for some form of photo ID, though.

Entry requirements - Ireland travel advice

FCDO travel advice for Ireland. Includes safety and security, insurance, entry requirements and legal differences.

www.gov.uk

Agree, but I’m wondering if the court order that ‘forced her to return’, maybe prevented him from travelling somehow, and that’s what made her return. And the Telegraph have misreported it as seizing his passport?…JMO

 

[DianaWW]

Bit more info here…

‘Marten fled to Dublin with her two children in December 2019. She rented a cottage for cash and lived “off grid” to avoid detection. Her father was working abroad but rushed back and appointed a solicitor to seek wardship of his grandchildren, with an application to the High Court in London on December 13.
A friend denied Marten’s claim that her father was “controlling”, adding: “He wanted his children to find as much freedom in life as possible, away from the trappings of wealth and all the rest of it, to go and make their own lives, like he has.” Napier Marten declined to comment.
Gordon, who remained in London, was ordered by the court to hand over his passport. Marten returned to the UK with her two children on January 9, 2020.’

https://archive.ph/LPnID

 

[MarziPanda]

Somewhat disappointing that the judge (or any person in charge of the proceedings in a room) could not resist being sarcastic, and he should know that needing to read the relevant part of a document isn't the same as needing to read it all.

He also seems to imply that Mark Gordon wouldn't understand what he read.

How Constance Marten and Mark Gordon tried to 'sabotage' their trial

The conditions were 'freezing', the food 'inadequate' and the days long, sometimes 19 hours with little or no rest.

www.dailymail.co.uk

But Gordon didn't ask to read a passage. Archbold Criminal Pleading, Evidence and Practice is the title of the whole book. I initially took the part you quoted to mean he wanted to read a chapter from Archbold called 'criminal pleading, evidence and practice' but no - that's just the name of the book. Gordon quite literally is saying he wants to read the whole book, 3500 pages, before he will allow the trial to proceed.

Considering the amount of higher education needed to fully comprehend that book, it's not a stretch to say Gordon wouldn't have understood it. But that's not what the judge was implying anyway.

JMO - play stupid games, win stupid prizes. Gordon was clearly trying to delay the trial (which is what both of them did continuously throughout) and the judge quite rightly put forward valid reasons to dismiss his attempts. Even your own link says Gordon tried to hold things up by claiming he needed to read irrelevant legislation.

 

[Skigh]

Bit more info here…

‘Marten fled to Dublin with her two children in December 2019. She rented a cottage for cash and lived “off grid” to avoid detection. Her father was working abroad but rushed back and appointed a solicitor to seek wardship of his grandchildren, with an application to the High Court in London on December 13.
A friend denied Marten’s claim that her father was “controlling”, adding: “He wanted his children to find as much freedom in life as possible, away from the trappings of wealth and all the rest of it, to go and make their own lives, like he has.” Napier Marten declined to comment.
Gordon, who remained in London, was ordered by the court to hand over his passport. Marten returned to the UK with her two children on January 9, 2020.’

https://archive.ph/LPnID

I can imagine how worried he must have been knowing how violent Gordon was especially after the injuries she received after being pushed from the window.

 

[AcerPacer]

My mummy and daddy cancelled again,’ their children told staff. One had a nightmare that monsters had taken their parents away, while another began bed-wetting and developed a stammer.

The hearings were once again beset by delays and problems. On the first day of the one in January 2022, the pair claimed to have Covid – sending in photos of positive lateral flow tests and only attending remotely.

The documents also reveal that Marten’s mother, Virginie de Selliers, had offered to be a potential carer for the two older children, saying that she ‘felt desperately sad for her daughter and the children’.
But having been given access to all the files, she then withdrew her offer. Her lawyer told the court of her reasoning: ‘She saw the relationship between the parents as an enmeshed and abusive one, and was concerned that if any of the children were placed with her she would not be able safely to care for them.’

From lady to tramp: £2.4m Constance Marten ended up scavenging in bins

From the dock of the Old Bailey, Constance Marten repeatedly insisted that she and Mark Gordon were good parents. But the official record of what actually happened paints a very different picture...

www.dailymail.co.uk

I find that very sad that her mother wanted to take the 2 elder children into her care then withdrew that offer after reading files. She probably felt the despicable duo would make her life (and in doing that make the children's lives) unbearable!

 

[AcerPacer]

No attempt is made in that article to acknowledge the effect on children of being put by their parents into residential institutions away from their parents for most of each year - an experience that is not familiar to most children.

This has nothing to do with the death of Victoria