Sydney man admits pushing gay American off a cliff in 1988

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — A person 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 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 loss of life on 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 prison.

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

White said 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 actual or threatened violence by unidentified persons who attacked him as a result of they perceived him to be gay.”

The coroner also found that gangs of males roamed numerous Sydney areas in the hunt for gay men to assault, ensuing in the deaths of some victims. Some individuals had been also robbed.

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

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

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

Helen White stated she read a newspaper report in 2008 about Johnson’s demise and requested her husband if he was accountable.

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

“I said, ‘It is when you chased him,’” Helen White advised the court. She mentioned her husband didn't reply.

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

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

“This man (Scott Johnson) who once instructed me he might never damage someone even in self-defense died in terror,” the brother added.

Steve Johnson stated he appreciated White’s guilty plea.

“If he had turned himself in after his violent motion, I'd 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 accomplice Michael Noone and Steve Johnson’s spouse Rosemarie Johnson additionally gave sufferer influence statements.

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

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

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

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

White had met Johnson in a close-by bar in suburban Manly and Johnson had stripped naked at the clifftop before he died, Hatfield said. He stated the gravity of the murder was significantly elevated because it was motivated by the victim’s sexuality.

White’s lawyer Belinda Rigg said 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 listening to that he was responsible, having beforehand denied the crime.

His legal professionals will attraction that plea in the Court of Felony Appeals and hope he might be acquitted at trial.

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