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 court heard on Monday.

Scott White, 51, appeared within 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 death at the base of a North Head cliff was initially dismissed by police as suicide.

White can 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 said in recorded police interview in 2020 that was performed in court docket.

White stated in the interview he lied when he had earlier told police that he had tried to grab Johnson and forestall his deadly fall.

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

The coroner also found that gangs of men roamed numerous Sydney locations in search of homosexual males to assault, ensuing within the deaths of some victims. Some folks had been also robbed.

A coroner had ruled in 1989 that the openly gay man had taken his personal life, while a second coroner in 2012 could not clarify how he died.

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

White’s former wife Helen White informed 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 loss of life 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 stated, ‘It's for those who chased him,’” Helen White instructed the court. She mentioned her husband didn't reply.

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

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

“This man (Scott Johnson) who once told me he could never harm 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 would have had somewhat extra sympathy. If he had grasped Scott’s hand and pulled him to safety, I would 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 spouse Rosemarie Johnson also gave victim influence statements.

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

Rebecca Johnson, a younger 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 stories of gay beatings in Sydney being described as a sport.

Prosecutor Brett Hatfield mentioned the precise details of the homicide weren't recognized and that White’s accounts had different.

White had met Johnson in a nearby bar in suburban Manly and Johnson had stripped naked on the clifftop before he died, Hatfield mentioned. He said the gravity of the murder was considerably elevated because it was motivated by the sufferer’s sexuality.

White’s lawyer Belinda Rigg stated her consumer 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 responsible, having beforehand denied the crime.

His legal professionals will enchantment that plea in the Courtroom of Criminal Appeals and hope he will probably be acquitted at trial.

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