Critical pieces of evidence for the prosecution were ruled out before the trial, but former Jetstar pilot Greg Lynn was still found guilty on one of two murder charges.
It can now be revealed the case against Lynn hit a major hurdle after a judge agreed Victorian detectives had ignored his legal rights over the suspected murders of secret lover campers Russell Hill and Carol Clay.
Lynn, 57, was today found guilty in the Supreme Court of Victoria of murdering Ms Clay – but not guilty of murdering Mr Hill.
Lynn had been behind bars since November 2021 when Special Operations Group officers arrested him near Arbuckle Junction in Victoria’s rugged mountain wilderness.
The prosecution case was thrown into turmoil months ago when Justice Michael Croucher ruled out Lynn’s epic four-day police record of interview on the grounds it had been illegally obtained.
Daily Mail Australia can now reveal police had made some mistakes from the start, leaving the crime scene under a tarp for nearly a month before the Missing Persons Unit even took over the case.
Police had been duped into thinking the couple had either been lost in the bush or vanished to elope, allowing the initial crime scene where the couple’s burnt campsite was found to be repeatedly disturbed.
Former Jetstar pilot Greg Lynn is taken away from court in handcuffs after he was found guilty of the murder of Carol Clay, but not guilty of Russell Hill’s
Carol Clay and Russell Hill had been camping secretly in the Victorian wilderness when they went missing
THE INTERVIEW
The shattered remains of Mr Hill, 74, and Ms Clay, 73 were only located after Lynn directed detectives to their location in remote bushland in Wongungarra.
Detectives had missed Lynn’s return trip to the area to destroy what was left of the bodies in November 2020 despite him being their only suspect.
A statement he made to detectives in July that year was also dumped for the trial.
While Lynn strategically allowed the jury to see sections of his official interview, the majority of it was dumped along with a swag of evidence the court ruled had been illegally obtained from it.
What the jury did see was a small portion of video of Lynn providing police with the very same story they had repeatedly heard in court since the trial opened in May.
What they weren’t told is that the section of interview they saw only came after Lynn had denied any wrongdoing for the previous three days.
The Crown case against Lynn had much riding on his record of interview to Victoria Police’s Missing Persons Squad detectives Brett Florence and Daniel Passingham.
The two seasoned detectives had grilled Lynn at Sale Police Station for days despite his repeated attempts to follow his lawyer’s advice and offer ‘no comment’ answers.
At its conclusion, the officers had fired-off 3,000 questions over a gruelling nine hours and 18 minutes conducted under bitterly cold conditions.
During secret pre-trial hearings in October and November, the court heard Sergeant Florence and Leading Senior Constable Passingham would stop at nothing until Lynn told them what they wanted to hear.
The hearings were held to ascertain what could and could not be put to a jury at Lynn’s murder trial, which had been scheduled to begin in February.
During secret pre-trial hearings, the two officers were grilled by both the Office of Public Prosecutions’ barrister John Dickie and Lynn’s top silk Dermot Dann, KC.
Greg Lynn enters the court during the last day of his trial last week
Police initially believed Russell Hill’s camp site (pictured) had been destroyed by a faulty mobile phone charger and the pair had vanished to elope in secret
Police released an image of what they claimed to be Greg Lynn driving away from the murder scene
The court heard the officers made no secret of their desire to locate the bodies of the missing campers, which stirred the ire of Justice Croucher more than once.
‘On reflection, do you think you might have ridden roughshod over those rights?’ Justice Croucher asked Senior Constable Passingham.
‘Absolutely,’ came the response.
Justice Croucher had been stunned by what he would later rule to be a violation of Lynn’s legal rights at the hands of the two detectives.
‘I’ve no doubt that you, as dedicated police officers, were doing your best to try and solve this missing persons matter. To find what you think, at that point, are the bodies and that’s your job. I understand that,’ Justice Croucher told the policeman.
‘But you do understand, don’t you, that an accused person in custody has rights too?’
When asked similar questions by the respected judge, Sergeant Florence too struggled to provide adequate answers,
‘At no point was I trying to undermine his rights, some of my questions may appear that way,’ the detective said.
The court heard Lynn had been allowed a brief conversation with a Victorian Legal Aid lawyer before sitting down to conduct what he believed would be a short interview.
‘I just feel like you’re allowing your lawyer to dictate your desire,’ Sergeant Florence told Lynn.
‘But it’s just like, this is you. It’s just like she’s telling you just – you might as well just tell lies.’
Sergeant Florence conceded he should have phrased some of his questions ‘a lot better’.
‘But my whole purpose at that point was, as I’ve said, it was recovery of those bodies,’ he told the judge.
Greg Lynn and his wife Melanie. The court heard she ‘cackled like a hyena’ upon seeing a car on 60 Minutes that turned out to be her husband’s. It was another fact the jury was never presented
Melanie Lynn had been a flight attendant. She attended everyday of her husband’s trial, waving and blowing him kisses
Mr Dann had been scathing of the officers’ behaviour, demanding they both admit what they did to Lynn had been outright wrong.
‘You must have realised – you must have realised – when you asked that question, that it was wrong, it was inappropriate. You must have realised that at the time?’ Mr Dann put to Senior Constable Passingham.
‘Yep, it’s not a very well phrased … expression at all,’ the detective responded.
‘It’s nothing to do with phraseology. It’s completely wrong to suggest that his lawyer, “Is – it’s like she’s telling you tell lies”. That’s just completely wrong, isn’t it?’ Mr Dann continued.
‘I’ve said that,’ came the response.
The court heard the detectives had used tactics against Lynn designed to make him talk despite his legal advice to remain silent – something referred to in police circles as the ‘peace method’.
‘You’re just trying to pump up his tyres, you know, “You can overcome this”… “you can get through this, start answering questions, you’ll overcome this problem”. That’s what that tactic is, isn’t it?’ Mr Dann asked.
‘Yeah, it’s again an effort to get his side of the story,’ Senior Constable Passingham said.
The court heard the detective had laid on the ‘mates tactic’ so hard, he at one stage suggested he and Lynn go camping together.
‘You might be able to come camping with me. I’ll show you how to go stalking, deer hunting, you understand?’ Senior Constable Passingham told Lynn.
‘I don’t hate you. I’d be quite happy to go camping with you, sitting around the campfire, but I don’t drink light beer.’
Sergeant Florence (left) and Leading Senior Constable Passingham leave court after a preliminary hearing in January 2023.
Top Melbourne barrister Dermot Dann, KC, fought to have Greg Lynn’s record of interview scrapped
When Mr Dann accused Senior Constable Passingham of doing anything possible to stop Lynn from responding with ‘no comment’ answers, the detective did not disagree.
‘I suppose so,’ he said.
Lynn had been arrested amid fears he was about to commit suicide on the mountain.
Police had been listening to him for months via devices in his car, phone and home.
But when taken into custody, he was not even seen to by a doctor after enduring the four-day interrogation.
Lynn’s interview had piqued the interest of Australia’s legal minds as it dragged on into its fourth day without any charges being laid.
Australian Lawyers Alliance Victorian representative Robert Starry said in his 40 years of criminal law practice he couldn’t remember a suspect being held for that long in Victoria.
‘It’s unusual to arrest someone and hold them for so long in custody. The question is whether it’s reasonable to hold him for so long, and the only people that can answer that are the police involved and the people advising him,’ he told The Age at the time.
Greg Lynn was subjected to a flawed investigation that ‘trounced’ his legal rights, but was found guilty of one murder
The shotgun used to shoot Carol Clay
A vintage Ghurkha Kukri Knife similar to that owned by Greg Lynn
No closure for Russell Hill’s family
The not guilty verdict will come as tragic news to the family of Mr Hill, who will now likely never see someone convicted over his death.
Lynn had maintained his innocence throughout his years in custody, maintaining he acted in self defence against a rampaging Mr Hill, who the jury heard accidentally shot his lover in a struggle with Lynn.
Lynn claimed Mr Hill died moments later after he came at him with a knife, falling on the blade and stabbing himself in the chest.
In January 2023, Sergeant Florence told Daily Mail Australia he had worked tirelessly on the case since it landed on his desk in April 2020 – just weeks after the lovers vanished.
He had just endured his first grilling by Mr Dann over the Lynn interview during a preliminary committal hearing at the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court.
Mr Dann is regarded as one of Australia’s best criminal barristers and has been defending accused crooks for almost as long as Sergeant Florence has been locking them up.
The KC has represented everyone from ‘Australia’s most hated man’ Richard Pusey to wife killer Borce Ristevski.
It can now be revealed Sergeant Florence knew his case was in trouble from the moment Mr Dann took on the case, but he maintained his job was to find the missing bodies.
‘I sleep okay at night knowing that,’ he said then.
Russell Hill’s daughters Debbie and Colleen said they were unable to properly grieve for their father without knowing what happened to him
Lynn’s barrister claimed Sergeant Florence had botched the investigation from the get-go, beginning with a statement Lynn made to him just months after the campers went missing.
Under the law, a person suspected of committing a crime must be issued with a caution before answering any questions police might have for them.
But Sergeant Florence claimed Lynn had been merely a ‘person of interest’ and not a real suspect.
During that first interview, Sergeant Florence had noted Lynn had painted his car brown since it passed by CCTV cameras in the mountains a distinct blue colour.
Recordings of conversations Lynn had with the detectives after his arrest were also scrapped, as was the contents of evidence obtained by police from a search on his property.
When the matter moved to the Supreme Court in September, Justice Croucher made it clear he had concerns about the prosecution case.
‘I should have thought, and I’ll be told if I’m wrong, that if you succeeded with all of the arguments that you’ve put, or at least most of them in your defence response… I should have thought that would be the end of the Crown case. But is there something I’m missing?’ he asked Mr Dann then.
‘That’s not for me to speak of really,’ Mr Dann responded. ‘But that’s how I see it, yes.’
Campers’ final moments
On the day police believed they died, Mr Hill and Ms Clay had visited a graveyard in the remote wilderness and buzzed other campers with a drone.
Weed sprayer Robert Williams told the trial he believed he had seen Mr Hill in the wilderness in the days before he was allegedly murdered.
He described Mr Hill as a ‘grumpy old bugger’ who later buzzed him with a drone.
‘I was getting droned out,’ he told police.
Mr Williams said he saw the drone hovering over other people’s campsites, which he believed were being filmed.
Carol Clay and Russell Hill had been secret lovers for years
Greg Lynn’s car went from white, to blue to brown over a number of years
Mr Hill had taken a drone with him on the trip, but it has never been found.
The court heard deer poachers were known to hunt in the area, with gunshots routinely echoing through the night.
Campers Damir Javor and Goran Miljkovic had seen the couple as they parked their vehicle at a camp site believed to be shared by Lynn.
He described the move as ‘strange’ given there was plenty of room for them to park elsewhere.
What happened next is only known by Lynn.
Secret relationship
The pair had been carrying out a secret affair for years behind the back of Mr Hill’s wife Robyn, who described Ms Clay as a ‘long-time family friend’.
While detectives probed the couple’s relationship, it was quickly ruled out as a likely reason for their mysterious disappearance.
Mr Hill’s Toyota four-wheel-drive had been found by local police next to his burnt-out tent, but the pair were gone without a trace.
The vehicle itself had also sustained damage in the fire, but was still able to be driven away from the scene.
At the time, police had believed the fire was probably started by a dodgy phone charger and that the couple had simply been lost in the forest.
Victorians were about to be placed into a COVID-19 lockdown that would continue for months on end.
Map of how Russell Hill and Carol Clay are believed to have met their fate
Mr Hill’s use of a drone in the remote wilderness may have got him killed. Forensic experts were only able to identify one bone belonging to him
Mr Hill had left his Drouin home on March 19 for a camping trip along the Dargo River in Victoria’s northeast and planned to leave the region on March 26.
Ms Clay, meanwhile, had told friends she was going away for a few days and expected to be home by March 28 or 29.
Mr Hill had been a keen amateur radio enthusiast and made his last broadcast from the bush in the days before his disappearance.
Police initially believed that perhaps the couple had died after Mr Hill lost his drone in the bush and the pair tried to retrieve it.
Mr Hill had been a seasoned camper and avid outdoors-man who wasn’t known to wander too far from where he set up his campsite.
Ms Clay’s belongings were found in the locked Toyota, which was partially burnt, and her car was later found at her Pakenham home.
Mrs Hill had no idea police were treating her husband’s disappearance as a murder until her daughter saw it on TV.
In April 2020, Mr Hill’s shattered wife of 50 years had lost all hope that he would return home and had started packing up his belongings.
‘I don’t think that he will still be alive,’ she said from the couple’s Drouin home at the time.
‘He’s always been on the radio. He didn’t call for quite a few days and then I started to get worried and thought “I’ve got to do something now”.’
Mrs Hill said her husband would routinely broadcast at the same time every night when his other radio chums were on the air.
‘They all get on at the same time and once I heard Russell I knew, on the Friday, that he was fine. But then I didn’t hear him again,’ she said.