Sydney man admits pushing homosexual American off a cliff in 1988

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — A man instructed police he killed American mathematician Scott Johnson in 1988 by pushing the 27-year-old off a Sydney cliff in what prosecutors describe as a homosexual hate crime, a courtroom heard on Monday.

Scott White, 51, appeared in the New South Wales state Supreme Court docket for a sentencing listening to after he pleaded responsible in January to the homicide of the Los Angeles-born Canberra resident, whose dying at the base of a North Head cliff was initially dismissed by police as suicide.

White will be sentenced by Justice Helen Wilson on Tuesday. He faces a possible sentence of life in jail.

“I pushed a bloke. He went over the edge,” White mentioned in recorded police interview in 2020 that was played in court docket.

White said within the interview he lied when he had earlier informed police that he had tried to seize Johnson and forestall his deadly fall.

A coroner ruled in 2017 that Johnson “fell from the clifftop as a result of precise or threatened violence by unidentified persons who attacked him as a result of they perceived him to be homosexual.”

The coroner also found that gangs of males roamed various Sydney locations searching for gay males to assault, ensuing in the deaths of some victims. Some individuals have been additionally robbed.

A coroner had dominated in 1989 that the openly gay man had taken his own life, whereas a second coroner in 2012 could not explain how he died.

His Boston-based brother Steve Johnson maintained stress for additional investigation and offered his personal reward of 1 million Australian dollars ($704,000) for information. White was charged in 2020 and police say the reward will probably be collected.

White’s former spouse Helen White informed the court docket that her then-husband “bragged” to their kids of beating homosexual men on the clifftop well-known for gay meetups.

Helen White said she learn a newspaper report in 2008 about Johnson’s demise and asked her husband if he was responsible.

“It’s not my fault,” Scott White allegedly replied. “The dumb (expletive) ran off the cliff.”

“I mentioned, ‘It's if you chased him,’” Helen White advised the courtroom. She mentioned her husband did not reply.

Below cross-examination, Helen White denied she had been aware of a AU$1 million reward for info on Johnson’s murder when she reported her former husband to police in 2019. She said she only became conscious of a reward when the victim’s brother, Steve Johnson, doubled the sum in 2020.

Steve Johnson stated in his sufferer affect assertion that, “With a vicious push, Mr. White took Scott and he vanished.”

“This man (Scott Johnson) who as soon as advised me he may never hurt someone even in self-defense died in terror,” the brother added.

Steve Johnson stated he appreciated White’s responsible plea.

“If he had turned himself in after his violent motion, I might have had a little bit extra sympathy. If he had grasped Scott’s hand and pulled him to security, I would owe him everlasting gratitude,” the brother stated, his voice choked with emotion.

Scott Johnson’s sisters Terry and Rebecca Johnson, his partner Michael Noone and Steve Johnson’s spouse Rosemarie Johnson additionally gave victim impact statements.

Rosemarie Johnson described the preliminary police failure to analyze Scott Johnson’s death as “indefensible and inhumane.”

Rebecca Johnson, a youthful sister, mentioned the police report of suicide “made no sense.”

“How may a community fail so spectacularly that they created boys capable of such horror?” she requested, referring to media stories of homosexual beatings in Sydney being described as a sport.

Prosecutor Brett Hatfield said the precise particulars of the murder were not identified and that White’s accounts had various.

White had met Johnson in a nearby bar in suburban Manly and Johnson had stripped naked at the clifftop earlier than he died, Hatfield mentioned. He mentioned the gravity of the homicide was significantly elevated as a result of it was motivated by the victim’s sexuality.

White’s lawyer Belinda Rigg mentioned her shopper was homosexual and had been concerned that his homophobic brother would find out.

In January, White yelled repeatedly in court docket throughout a pre-trial hearing that he was guilty, having beforehand denied the crime.

His lawyers will appeal that plea in the Courtroom of Criminal Appeals and hope he will likely be acquitted at trial.

Scott Johnson was a doctoral scholar at Australian Nationwide College and lived in Canberra. He was staying at Noone’s parents’ Sydney dwelling when he died.