Sydney man admits pushing gay American off a cliff in 1988

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — A person advised 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 court heard on Monday.

Scott White, 51, appeared within the New South Wales state Supreme Court docket for a sentencing listening to after he pleaded guilty 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 will probably be sentenced by Justice Helen Wilson on Tuesday. He faces a potential sentence of life in jail.

“I pushed a bloke. He went over the edge,” White said in recorded police interview in 2020 that was performed in courtroom.

White stated in the interview he lied when he had earlier told police that he had tried to seize Johnson and stop his fatal fall.

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

The coroner also discovered that gangs of males roamed various Sydney locations in the hunt for homosexual men to assault, ensuing within the deaths of some victims. Some people had been additionally robbed.

A coroner had ruled in 1989 that the brazenly homosexual man had taken his personal life, while a second coroner in 2012 couldn't explain how he died.

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

White’s former spouse Helen White instructed the courtroom that her then-husband “bragged” to their kids of beating homosexual males on the clifftop well-known for homosexual meetups.

Helen White stated she read 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 said, ‘It's if you chased him,’” Helen White instructed the court. She stated her husband didn't reply.

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

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

“This man (Scott Johnson) who once told me he may by no means harm someone even in self-defense died in terror,” the brother added.

Steve Johnson mentioned he appreciated White’s guilty plea.

“If he had turned himself in after his violent action, I'd have had slightly more 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 partner Michael Noone and Steve Johnson’s spouse Rosemarie Johnson additionally gave sufferer impression statements.

Rosemarie Johnson described the preliminary police failure to investigate Scott Johnson’s loss of life as “indefensible and inhumane.”

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

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

Prosecutor Brett Hatfield stated the exact particulars of the murder weren't known and that White’s accounts had assorted.

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

White’s lawyer Belinda Rigg stated her client was homosexual and had been involved that his homophobic brother would discover out.

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

His attorneys will enchantment that plea in the Courtroom of Legal Appeals and hope he shall be acquitted at trial.

Scott Johnson was a doctoral student at Australian Nationwide University and lived in Canberra. He was staying at Noone’s dad and mom’ Sydney residence when he died.