‘I’m innocent’: Greg Lynn’s plea to police when charged with murder of missing campers

As Greg Lynn’s record of interview with police wound down, there was little left to say. He had taken the detectives through how Russell Hill and Carol Clay met their demise and the steps he’d taken to cover up their deaths.

Finally, Detective Senior Constable Brett Florence told the former pilot he would be charged with two counts of murder.

Detectives Daniel Passingham (left) and Brett Florence questioned Greg Lynn at Sale.Credit: Wayne Taylor

“Do you wish to say anything in answer to that charge or charges?” Florence asked.

Lynn replied: “I’m innocent of murder. I haven’t behaved well, I’ve made some poor decisions, but murder, as I understand it, I am innocent.”

By then, Lynn, 57, had directed detectives to the location at Union Spur Track, north of Dargo, where he had disposed of – and later returned to and burnt – the bodies of Hill and Clay.

On Tuesday, a Supreme Court jury heard more about what Lynn had told detectives at Sale police station in the aftermath of his November 2021 arrest.

A map of Bucks Camp with drawings on it by Lynn that show where Hill and Clay were camping, bottom of drawing, and where Lynn’s car and camp was, top of drawing.Credit: Supreme Court of Victoria

In the recorded interview, Lynn said that after he realised Hill and Clay were both dead, he started a methodical plan to cover up what had happened at the Wonnangatta Valley campsite on March 20, 2020.

“I just focused on getting the job done,” he said.

Lynn told police he had set fire to the pair’s campsite, bundled the bodies into his box trailer, and driven through the night until he arrived at Union Spur Track.

There, Lynn hid the bodies with sticks and leaves before driving out of the area via Harrietville, stopping to buy petrol with $40 he had stolen from Hill’s wallet. That was a way to avoiding using a credit card that would be linked to him.

Former airline pilot Gregory Lynn is on trial over the alleged murders of Carol Clay and Russell Hill.Credit: Monique Westermann

Lynn said that after the pair died, he panicked and knew that if he reported what had happened to police, he would lose his career and memberships of exclusive clubs he had recently been accepted into.

“I panicked to save myself,” he said.

“An event like that, I’d be instantly banned for life and this was at a time when I was just finding a really happy place in the world. Family, career and my personal life outside of work. So this for me was a disaster.

“I thought, ‘What else can I possibly do?’”

Lynn said he then set himself a list of tasks to complete.

“This had the potential of enabling me to live a normal life, if I were to cover it up,” he told police.

“The objective was not to make them as such disappear, but for me to disappear. And then you knocked on my door.”

Lynn said that when that visit from police happened at his Caroline Springs home in July 2020, he knew he was on their radar.

Missing persons squad detectives Andrew Stamper (left) and Brett Florence outside Sale police station in 2021.Credit: Nine News

When asked if he had sustained any injuries during a campsite scuffle with Hill, Lynn replied only small bruises.

He also told detectives he had never told his wife, Melanie Lynn, what had occurred, recalling that when he arrived home after the pair’s deaths, she appeared too distracted by the pending pandemic lockdown to ask questions about his solo trip away.

“I’d spoken to her on the Saturday and she told me, ‘Greg, the whole country is going into lockdown; it’s absolute pandemonium.’ I said I could tell something was up because I’d seen cars driving everywhere,” he told police.

“She said, ‘I can’t buy toilet paper, can’t buy cleaning stuff, stores are just empty.’

“She didn’t ask me anything about my trip because there was so much going on. Camping is not her thing anyway.”

Lynn has pleaded not guilty to murder, and claims Hill, 74, and Clay, 73, died accidentally. He told police that he and Hill were struggling over Lynn’s shotgun when it accidentally fired and struck Clay, killing her.

He told police that soon after Clay was shot dead, Hill ran at him with a black-handled kitchen knife and died when he fell on the knife during a struggle.

Lynn said the knife had penetrated the area around Hill’s heart as the pair fell to the ground.

He said he then pulled the knife from Hill’s chest and later burnt it in a fire alongside the 74-year-old’s drone.

The prosecution disputes his account and says Lynn killed the pair with murderous intent.

The trial continues.

A new podcast from 9News, The Age and 9Podcasts will follow the court case as it unfolds. The Missing Campers Trial is the first podcast to follow a jury trial in real time in Victoria. It’s presented by Nine reporter Penelope Liersch and Age reporter Erin Pearson.