Sydney man admits pushing gay 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 court docket heard on Monday.

Scott White, 51, appeared in the New South Wales state Supreme Court for a sentencing listening to after he pleaded responsible in January to the murder 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 probably 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 edge,” White mentioned in recorded police interview in 2020 that was performed in court docket.

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

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

The coroner also found that gangs of men roamed varied Sydney places in the hunt for gay men to assault, ensuing within the deaths of some victims. Some people have been additionally robbed.

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

His Boston-based brother Steve Johnson maintained stress for further 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 possible be collected.

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

Helen White stated she read a newspaper report in 2008 about Johnson’s death 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's should you chased him,’” Helen White advised the courtroom. She stated her husband didn't reply.

Under cross-examination, Helen White denied she had been conscious of a AU$1 million reward for information on Johnson’s murder when she reported her former husband to police in 2019. She said she only turned 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 might never hurt someone even in self-defense died in terror,” the brother added.

Steve Johnson said he appreciated White’s responsible plea.

“If he had turned himself in after his violent motion, I might 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 stated, his voice choked with emotion.

Scott Johnson’s sisters Terry and Rebecca Johnson, his companion Michael Noone and Steve Johnson’s wife Rosemarie Johnson also gave sufferer impact statements.

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

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

“How may a group 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 stated the precise particulars of the murder weren't recognized 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 stated. He said the gravity of the murder was significantly elevated because it was motivated by the victim’s sexuality.

White’s lawyer Belinda Rigg mentioned her client was homosexual and had been involved 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 previously denied the crime.

His legal professionals will attraction that plea within the Courtroom of Felony Appeals and hope he can 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 home when he died.