The moment the police moved in to arrest aristocrat Constance Marten’s friend has been revealed as detectives continue to question the couple and hundreds of desperate officers search for their newborn baby.
Marten, 35, and Mark Gordon, 48, were spotted withdrawing money in Stanmer Villas, Brighton, on Monday night before being arrested following a tip-off from a member of the public.
They have refused to reveal the location of their two-month-old baby as senior police officers now suspect them of grossly negligent homicide.
The images obtained by The mirror shows officers along with Gordon as they swoop in to arrest him.
Witnesses said officers apparently held Gordon for about 40 minutes when Marten broke down in tears and begged them to let him go.
Constance Marten (left), 35, and Mark Gordon (right), 48, were spotted withdrawing money at Stanmer Villas, Brighton, on Monday night
The couple were reportedly seen at a food bank nearly a week before their arrest with the baby reportedly absent.
A man who saw the arrest of Constance Marten and Mark Gordon said: ‘It was very dramatic.
“I was in my van at the time, about 9:30 p.m. last night. There was a couple in front of me. Two police officers, a man and a woman, approached the couple.
“They went to the man first, he struggled and resisted arrest. The woman he was with yelled at the officers and told them to be careful because he was having mental health issues.
A second police car arrived and backup officers helped restrain the man. They knelt on his back. He moaned in pain.
“The woman was handcuffed, but she was treated much softer. The man must have resisted his arrest for about 40 minutes. I was worried because there were about three or four cops trying to subdue him. They sat on top of him to keep him from running away.’
Marten was wearing a thick winter coat and was carrying a bag with groceries just before the arrest. Gordon followed close behind with two shopping bags and a large stick that appears to have been retrieved from a nearby forest.
The couple have refused to reveal the sex of their baby or its whereabouts to police.
Hundreds of officers are on a desperate search across the South Downs to find the child.
This is when the police moved in to arrest aristocrat Constance Marten’s boyfriend, Mark Gordon
This is runaway aristocrat Constance Marten (right) and Mark Gordon (left) just before their arrest in Brighton on Monday night
Police search teams in Roedale Valley Allotments, Brighton, where an urgent search is underway to find Constance Marten’s missing baby. 200 cops watching
Police are offering a £10,000 reward for any information leading to the safe discovery, as Marten and Gordon are still being questioned by detectives at various Sussex police stations.
The couple have been traveling across the UK by taxi since their car was found ablaze on the M61 in Bolton, Greater Manchester, on January 5.
The baby was said to have been born in the back seat of a car around January 5.
Authorities previously believed the pair had slept in a blue tent and avoided being tracked down by police by regularly walking around and keeping their faces covered by CCTV footage.
The couple traveled from Bolton to Liverpool, then Harwich in Essex, then East London and then Newhaven in East Sussex, where they were seen at the ferry port on January 8.
Detective Lewis Basford, the senior investigating officer on the search, insisted his team was still hopeful and there was still a slim chance that someone could hold the baby on behalf of the couple.
But at a press conference yesterday afternoon “maybe this won’t end the way we’d like” because the pair had refused to reveal the location despite being questioned for a “considerable amount of time”.
The detective said the chances of finding the child alive were decreasing by the hour, adding: “If you know where this baby is, talk to us.”
“The interview process continues,” he told a news conference.
The couple have not disclosed the baby’s location – nor gender – and would still refuse to cooperate with police.
Supt Basford, however, called on the public to provide information on the baby’s whereabouts, saying police were still offering a £10,000 reward for information leading to its safe discovery.
The officer said police could not rule out that the couple, who had been carrying a large amount of cash, had encountered someone sympathetic to their plight.
Detective Superintendent Lewis Basford (left), the senior investigating officer involved in the search for the missing baby at a press conference this afternoon
Detective Superintendent Lewis Basford (left) and Superintendent James Collis speak to the media outside Roedale Valley Allotments, West Sussex, where an urgent search is underway to find Constance Marten’s missing baby
Hundreds of police officers are involved in the search for the missing baby in allotments and woodlands in north Brighton.
Mulberry’s shop on Hollingbury Place in Brighton where Constance Marten was seen withdrawing money by a member of the public who alerted police
Police search teams in Roedale Valley Allotments, Brighton, where an urgent search operation is underway to find the missing baby of Constance Marten, who has been deprived of medical care since birth in early January
He said, “While we still have hope that the baby can be found safe and sound, we need to keep that hope.
“In terms of the cold and the impact that would have on a baby, the risk obviously increases and we have to be open to the fact that this might not end the way we’d like.”
He said: ‘We must always be open to our research. It’s one reason why we offered the £10,000 reward and that reward remains open.’
