Jeffrey Wong: How police solved cold case murder of Gold Coast businessman after 1989 disappearance

A Gold Coast businessman was killed at his workplace and buried in an unknown northern NSW field. It took police nearly 20 years to solve the crime. This is how they did it.

GOLD Coast businessman Jeffrey Wong waved goodbye to his wife Susan and left for work.

He was never seen alive again by his family.

The death of 37-year-old on May 18, 1989, went unsolved for more than two decades before a major breakthrough 15 years ago which finally revealed his fate.

Mr Wong was last seen alive at his business Stop Performance Motors at Currumbin late in the morning of that fateful day.

His business partner, Graham Lawrence Anderson, told police at the time that he had spoken to Mr Wong just before noon before leaving to pick up some tools.

He claimed that Mr Wong was gone when he returned.

Gold Coast businessman Jeffrey Wong.

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* ‘ONE OF OUR MOST DANGEROUS’: THE KILLER WHO MURDERED MELISSA

* ‘OFFENSIVE’: HERO’S FAREWELL FOR KILLER AFTER EX-GIRLFRIEND’S SLAYING

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* ‘TERRIFYING’: VICTIM’S WORDS FOR COAST’S ‘SMIRKING STALKER’ AFTER ATTACK

Police found a bloody newspaper and hair which matched Mr Wong at the scene behind a car owned by Anderson, a mechanic.

Gold Coast CIB chief Insp. Ken Martin led a team of detectives who began investigating the crime and said foul play was immediately suspected.

“We have all along felt there was foul play and the human blood found indicates it could be a possible homicide,’’ he told media at the time.

The case went cold immediately and police continued to search for Mr Wong, who was classified as missing, believed murdered.

Fast-forward to June 1993 and a coronial inquest was held at Southport Magistrates Court into Mr Wong’s disappearance.

Acting Insp Kevin Matthews told the court the evidence suggested Wong was killed at the workshop but admitted much of it was circumstantial.

Jaydon Wong, Susan Wong and Jemma Wong.

Insp Matthews tendered a $100,000 ransom note to the court and claimed his investigation had “linked names and telephone numbers found in Wong’s papers at his Elanora house with prostitution and known criminals in Sydney”.

He told the court “at least two of Wong’s alleged associates were suspected by NSW police of murder or conspiracy to murder and others had met with violent deaths.”

Mrs Wong, who was reported as living in hiding in Sydney at the time, sat in court during the proceedings while a subpoena was issued for Anderson’s appearance but went unserved because he could not be found at the time.

The inquest found Mr Wong had been “murdered by person or persons unknown”.

The case went cold again for another 15 years until 2008 when investigators from the State Crime Operations Command homicide investigation group reopened their investigation and used new advances in DNA and forensic testing would help expose his killer.

Rodney Stewart Defilippis

A breakthrough was made soon afterwards when police in January 2009 arrested and charged Anderson with murder. They also arrested former police officer turned bikie Rodney Stewart DeFilippis, a 52-year-old Currumbin man who was charged with interfering with a corpse.

Police told the court that an informant and DeFilippis had taken Mr Wong’s body in his car to Cabarita where a bush grave was dug.

He was later unable to pinpoint where the body had been buried because of years of development.

DeFilippis was caught after the informant wore a wire and recorder their conversation at the pub. Anderson died in 2009 before his murder charge was dealt with.

DeFilippis was given the maximum sentence of two years jail for being an accessory after the fact to manslaughter, and released on parole in March 2011. The Wong family tendered moving Victim impact statements to the court laying out their grief at not knowing Mr Wong’s fate for decades and wondering if he’d ever return home to them.