The trial of campsite murderer Greg Lynn
Sam Hawley: The trial of the missing campers in Victoria fascinated Australians and now Greg Lynn, the former Jetstar pilot, is a convicted murderer. He’s awaiting sentencing after being found guilty of killing Carol Clay. He was found not guilty of murdering Russell Hill. Today, creator of the Trace podcast, Rachael Brown, takes us through the captivating and highly unusual case. I’m Sam Hawley on Gadigal land in Sydney. This is ABC News Daily.
News report: Let’s go back to our breaking news now. A Supreme Court jury has found former Jetstar pilot Greg Lynn guilty of murdering camper Carol Clay in March 2020, but not guilty of murdering Russell Hill.
News report: Well, Greg Lynn walked into court smiling, but he looked shocked when the jury read out their verdict.
News report: Finally, some answers for the families more than four years since the campers went missing.
Sam Hawley: Rach, we’ll go to these verdicts and how this trial unfolded in a moment, but first I really want you to take us back to March 2020 when Russell Hill and Carol Clay disappeared. What was going on at that time?
Rachael Brown: So they head off on a camping trip in the Victorian Alps in the Wonnangatta Valley, and to set the scene for you, it is one of the most remote, unforgiving and potentially dangerous places in Australia and perhaps the world. You enter on ridgelines high on the mountains and then have to drop into the river valleys. No reception, and that was the last time they were ever heard of.
News report: Police are concerned for the welfare of two campers in their 70s who are missing in Victoria’s high country. Here we have two people that have literally vanished into the wilderness.
Rachael Brown: Some people didn’t even know they were away together. They’d been having a long-term affair, which added to the mystery. So there was a lot of speculation about what might have happened. Did they just decide to run away together? But the weird thing about this situation was their campsite was completely burnt out, but no-one knew where this couple was, and for ages it was still treated as they were missing, it wasn’t treated as a potential murder. And of course, adding to the trouble is Australia went into lockdown, so police say they were hard up against how to investigate this, what was then a missing persons case.
Sam Hawley: Yeah, and it wasn’t, Rach, until November 2021, so 20 months after they went missing, that police actually made an arrest.
Rachael Brown: Yes, so they arrested Jetstar pilot and father, Greg Lynn. Now, he was arrested at a campsite called, or near Arbuckle, also up in the valley, and that was because they’d been tapping his car, but they’d heard on listening devices him talking to himself, sounding depressed, talking to himself in past tense. So they thought, oh, he sounds depressed, we know he’s got guns on him, maybe we need to swoop in now. So they arrested him in November 2021.
Sam Hawley: So why did it actually take them so long to find him, though? Is it just because of these lockdowns or was there something more?
Rachael Brown: The had a little part to play, and the police didn’t even get to visit the site of the burnt out tent until November 2020, so eight months after they disappeared. But the crucial thing, and it was ironic that it was a phone ping, because pilots hate phones being on, but it was the phone ping of Russell Hill on a tower near Mount Hotham that police went, oh, well, you know, his tent’s burnt down, but his phone has just pinged here. So they looked at all the cars that had gone through a camera registration checkpoint near Mount Hotham. They checked 12 cars, but the only one of those 12 cars that followed the Great Alpine Road and then up onto the Dargo High Plains Road, which was the route that Russell Hill’s phone seemed to have taken, was the car of Greg Lynn. So they arrive at his house in Caroline Springs in June 2020 to question him, and they noticed that his car had changed colour. It used to be dark and it was now beige, so that raised their suspicions even further.
Sam Hawley: And in October 2021, Rach, the families of Russell Hill and Carol Clay spoke publicly for the first time about the anguish of not knowing what had happened to them.
Colleen and Debbie, daughters of Russell Hill: It’s hard, it’s really hard. It’s not getting any better. Not knowing. Not knowing. He just, it’s just unknown. He just disappeared and he just stuck. He’s just stuck in the middle of not knowing.
Jill Walker, sister of Carol Clay: My message to them is that you’ve undertaken a heinous act and you’ve got to live with that for the rest of your life and it’s time to turn yourself in. We just need closure.
Sam Hawley: So the really interesting thing, Rach, about this is that he evaded police for so long, Greg Lynn, but then he actually told them that he was there when Russell Hill and Carol Clay died, but he says, you know, they were both accidentally killed.
Rachael Brown: Correct. So in the record of interview that was done at the Sale Police Station in November 2021, he did say that. He said, look, you know, I was present, they died accidentally and I’ll step you through this. So Greg Lynn says that Russell Hill came up to him and said, I’ve caught you on my drone, I’ve got footage of you hunting too close to camp, I’m going to take it to the police. And Greg Lynn thought, that’s annoying, but he says he went and made his dinner and then he says, no, stuff that, I’m going to annoy you, you’ve annoyed me, blasted loud music. He says Russell Hill then came over and didn’t talk about the music but took one of his guns out of the back of Greg Lynn’s car and walked back to Russell’s campsite. After that, Greg Lynn says a tussle ensued when Greg tried to get his gun back and the gun went off and hit Carol Clay in the head. Greg Lynn says he then took the gun, walked back to the car, locked it in his car, turned around and Russell Hill was coming at him with a knife saying she’s dead, as in Carol Clay. Then apparently a second tussle ensued in which Russell Hill allegedly fell on his own knife. So that was Greg Lynn’s story, two accidents in a very short space of time. Police and the prosecutors were like, that’s preposterous, that didn’t happen. You have somehow had an argument with Russell Hill, he’s somehow died and Carol Clay you have executed because she was the only surviving witness. So those are the two stories. So Greg Lynn says he then moved their bodies from Buck’s camp, along with their belongings, to another remote site following their deaths and he says that he did that because he thought no one would believe that it had been an accident. So he described to police the, quote, difficult task of burning the remains of Mr Hill and Ms Clay months after their deaths. He said, I didn’t want to do it. It was a horrific thing to have to deal with. I was sick when I was there several times but I steeled myself for it and I worked through the night. He says he was worried if he ever went to police or if anyone ever found out that he’d lose his job as a pilot and that would put his family in severe financial strain and he’d lose membership of his beloved gun clubs.
Sam Hawley: All right. Well, that was Greg Lynn’s explanation of what happened. Of course, police didn’t believe that. So let’s go to the trial and now this verdict. As we know, Greg Lynn has now been found guilty of the murder of Carol Clay but he has been raged acquitted of Russell Hill’s murder. Just tell me what the court’s found.
Rachael Brown: Well, the Supreme Court jury delivered this split verdict after six days of deliberations and that was after a trial that lasted for five weeks. And I think the jury was in a difficult position because of what we’ve spoken about. There was no evidence to hang a finding on because Greg Lynn had destroyed so much of the evidence. So what I think has happened, and I wish I could ask them but you can’t, it’s contempt, I think they’ve thought we just, we can’t say guilty on Russell Hill because there’s not enough evidence. We can’t prove beyond reasonable doubt it was murder but with Carol Clay they must have decided that the prosecution’s argument was correct, that she was executed as the only remaining witness.
Sam Hawley: And that result, it really goes to the fact that the details of this case were so unusual, doesn’t it?
Rachael Brown: Oh, Sam, it’s actually one of the most unique cases I’ve ever covered because I listened to the prosecution opening, everything that happened, how Greg Lynn tried to cover up his involvement in the deaths and one bystander might think, yep, game set much for the Crown. But then the defence stood up for their opening and said, yep, Mr Lynn admits to all of that. So clever perhaps you might say as a defence strategy because the only matter in dispute is the most important one, that tiny little thing called criminal intent which you need to prove murder. And the only person that knows that is Greg Lynn because the other two witnesses are dead. So for the cover-up to be agreed on by both parties, it made it such an odd case and that cover-up was a big one. It involved, and stick with me here, it’s a long list, Greg Lynn failing to report the deaths, throwing Russell Hill and Carol Clay’s belongings into the tent and burning it, taking cards from their wallets to make it look like a robbery, removing from Buck’s camp their bodies as well as their phones, car keys and drone, putting them in a trailer, driving them several hours through the night to Union Spur and dumping them, burning their phones and drone, painting his car, removing a side awning so it looked less like his car, selling his trailer, returning to Union Spur in May 2020 to check their bodies remained hidden and then again in November 2020 to burn their bodies and scatter the remains. So both parties agreed on that which is quite an incredulous situation but it did come down to whether there was murderous intent there and the defence said there was none but of course the prosecution said that’s ridiculous. He made every effort to conceal all the evidence because it was murder, that it could only have been murder, that he wouldn’t have taken these steps unless he believed he’d committed murder. So, yeah, quite a fascinating case, Sam, to sit through five weeks of this.
Sam Hawley: Yeah, absolutely and really interesting as well, Rach, is that we’ve learnt so much information since the verdict because there was actually quite a lot that the jurors didn’t hear, including details around the death of Greg Lynn’s first wife.
Rachael Brown: Yes, so Lisa Lynn was found dead on her front lawn in 1999 in Mount Macedon and a coroner ruled it that she’d overdosed on drugs and alcohol but statements came out in pre-trial, which we’re not allowed to report until after verdict, statements that her parents had made at the coronial inquest that was held into her death. Lisa Lynn’s mum says, quote, as far as I’m concerned Greg is responsible for my daughter’s death by mental torture. She was living in absolute fear of Greg. Her actions were a combination of fear and terror that she lived under and the mum goes in to explain that Greg would subject her to physical and mental abuse on a frequent basis. He would yell and throw things and push her around. She says, quote, he has a warped mind. He’s done things in the past like killing animals and refused to feed the children. Other things the jury weren’t told was his house and car were under surveillance and phone taps, secret recordings were not played to the jury and then of course only four hours of his police interview was played to the jury when it was a nine-hour interview.
Sam Hawley: What happens now then, Rach? Are there appeals to be had and where does it go from here?
Rachael Brown: The next stage of the process, Sam, is on July 19 when a date will be set for a plea hearing. That’s when both parties argue what kind of sentence Greg Lynn should receive and then I suspect sentencing will be maybe a month after that. So we could be looking at a sentence in say, I don’t know, into late October I’d guess. In terms of appeals I think it’s quite too early to say. Greg Lynn has an appeal window of 28 days from his sentence.
Sam Hawley: Well, it’s a fascinating case but of course for the families of Carol Clay and Russell Hillit must have been a terrible ordeal that’s dragged on of course for years and years. I mean they must have really mixed feelings about this given the mixed verdict here.
Rachael Brown: Yeah, I can’t even imagine what it’s been like for them and I’ve often seen them sitting in court watching it all play out. They issued a joint statement. I’ll just read that out. We thank the jury for their verdict of guilty in the murder of Carol Clay. It was an extremely difficult task given that the accused destroyed so much evidence. The verdict of not guilty in relation to the murder of Russell Hill is devastating. Our families were always aware that the prosecutor had an enormous burden of proof as there were no eyewitnesses. The accused was the only person who saw and experienced what happened. He’s also the only person who emerged alive. We are heartbroken at the loss of our loved ones. It will take time to absorb the verdicts, put this behind us and set about healing and getting on with our lives.
Sam Hawley: Rachael Brown is the creator of The Trace podcast and develops true crime podcasts for the ABC. This episode was produced by Bridget Fitzgerald with audio production by Anna John. Our supervising producer is David Coady. I’m Sam Hawley. ABC News Daily will be back again tomorrow. Thanks for listening.
