Sydney man admits pushing gay American off a cliff in 1988

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — A man told 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 gay hate crime, a courtroom heard on Monday.

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

White shall 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 sting,” White stated in recorded police interview in 2020 that was played in court.

White stated within the interview he lied when he had earlier instructed police that he had tried to grab Johnson and stop his fatal fall.

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

The coroner also discovered that gangs of males roamed varied Sydney locations searching for homosexual males to assault, ensuing within the deaths of some victims. Some folks had been additionally robbed.

A coroner had dominated in 1989 that the overtly gay man had taken his own life, while a second coroner in 2012 couldn't explain how he died.

His Boston-based brother Steve Johnson maintained strain for additional investigation and provided 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 wife Helen White informed the court that her then-husband “bragged” to their children of beating gay men on the clifftop well-known for gay meetups.

Helen White stated she read a newspaper report in 2008 about Johnson’s loss of life and requested her husband if he was responsible.

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

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

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

Steve Johnson mentioned in his victim impact assertion that, “With a vicious push, Mr. White took Scott and he vanished.”

“This man (Scott Johnson) who as soon as told me he might by no means hurt somebody 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 action, I might have had somewhat extra sympathy. If he had grasped Scott’s hand and pulled him to safety, I might owe him everlasting gratitude,” the brother said, his voice choked with emotion.

Scott Johnson’s sisters Terry and Rebecca Johnson, his companion 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, stated the police report of suicide “made no sense.”

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

Prosecutor Brett Hatfield said the precise particulars of the homicide weren't known 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 before he died, Hatfield mentioned. He said the gravity of the murder was considerably elevated as a result of it was motivated by the victim’s sexuality.

White’s lawyer Belinda Rigg said her consumer was gay and had been concerned that his homophobic brother would find out.

In January, White yelled repeatedly in court during a pre-trial listening to that he was responsible, having beforehand denied the crime.

His lawyers will enchantment that plea within the Court docket of Prison Appeals and hope he can be acquitted at trial.

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