Sydney man admits pushing gay American off a cliff in 1988

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — A person advised 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 gay hate crime, a court docket heard on Monday.

Scott White, 51, appeared in the New South Wales state Supreme Courtroom for a sentencing listening to after he pleaded responsible in January to the murder of the Los Angeles-born Canberra resident, whose demise on the base of a North Head cliff was initially dismissed by police as suicide.

White might be sentenced by Justice Helen Wilson on Tuesday. He faces a potential sentence of life in jail.

“I pushed a bloke. He went over the edge,” White stated in recorded police interview in 2020 that was performed in courtroom.

White stated in the interview he lied when he had earlier instructed police that he had tried to grab Johnson and prevent his fatal fall.

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

The coroner also found that gangs of males roamed varied Sydney locations searching for gay men to assault, ensuing in the deaths of some victims. Some people had been also robbed.

A coroner had dominated in 1989 that the openly gay 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 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 children of beating homosexual males on the clifftop well-known for gay meetups.

Helen White mentioned she read a newspaper report in 2008 about Johnson’s demise and asked 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 in the event you chased him,’” Helen White instructed the courtroom. 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 stated she only grew to become conscious of a reward when the victim’s brother, Steve Johnson, doubled the sum in 2020.

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

“This man (Scott Johnson) who as soon as informed me he may never harm somebody even in self-defense died in terror,” the brother added.

Steve Johnson mentioned he appreciated White’s guilty plea.

“If he had turned himself in after his violent action, I would have had a bit more sympathy. If he had grasped Scott’s hand and pulled him to security, I'd owe him eternal gratitude,” the brother said, 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 sufferer impact statements.

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

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

“How might a group fail so spectacularly that they created boys capable of such horror?” she asked, referring to media reviews of gay beatings in Sydney being described as a sport.

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

White had met Johnson in a nearby bar in suburban Manly and Johnson had stripped bare at the clifftop earlier than he died, Hatfield said. He said the gravity of the homicide was considerably elevated as a result of it was motivated by the sufferer’s sexuality.

White’s lawyer Belinda Rigg mentioned her consumer was gay and had been concerned that his homophobic brother would discover out.

In January, White yelled repeatedly in court during a pre-trial hearing that he was responsible, having beforehand denied the crime.

His lawyers will appeal that plea in the Court of Felony Appeals and hope he might be acquitted at trial.

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