Bronwyn Winfield’s handbag held a ring that turned up again years after she disappeared

A broken signet ring last seen in suspected murder victim Bronwyn Winfield’s handbag was later given away as a gift by her estranged husband.

Jon Winfield pictured on the beach near Lennox Head in 2024. Picture: Liam Mendes

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A broken signet ring last seen in suspected murder victim Bronwyn Winfield’s handbag was later given away as a gift by her estranged husband.

Chrystal Winfield, who was 10 when her mother vanished from Lennox Head in 1993, was the ring’s original owner and told of its “strange” reappearance years later.

Giving evidence at a 2002 inquest into her mother’s disappearance, Chrystal said she was taken aback to discover her stepfather Jon Winfield had given the ring to his youngest daughter, her half-sister Lauren. Police detectives were unable to find Bronwyn’s handbag after Mr Winfield reported her missing.

Lauren Winfield, far left, and Chrystal Winfield, far right, with neighbourhood children in Lennox Head.

Chrystal’s evidence is revealed in The Australian’s investigative podcast Bronwyn, which questions how the ring materialised as a gift if it was inside that handbag.

“I had a signet ring that was given to me when I was very young, and it was broken at that point in time, it had split,” she said.

“I swore she (Bronwyn) had it in her handbag cause she was going to get it fixed – because I remember going through her bag one time and finding it and thinking ‘Oh Mum, you’re going to get this fixed’, and I just swore it was in her handbag.

“And then not that long ago, a couple of years ago or maybe three years ago, Lauren said ‘oh look what Dad gave me’, and it was my ring and I thought ‘that’s my signet ring’.”

Chrystal is Bronwyn’s daughter from a previous relationship.

Lauren is Bronwyn and Mr Winfield’s daughter and was five when her mum went missing.

Mr Winfield, now 70, has been a long-time police suspect in Bronwyn’s suspected murder, but has always maintained his innocence.

Chrystal Winfield gave evidence her stepfather Jon Winfield was angry she spoke to police without his older daughter from a previous relationship, Jodie Main.

He has said Bronwyn walked out of the home on the night of Sunday, May 16, telling him she needed a break.

She was never seen or heard from again.

“I recognised it straight away,” Chrystal said of the ring.

“It was just the strangest thing. And I thought, ‘oh well, maybe it wasn’t in her bag’. I don’t know. It was just weird.”

Lauren handed the ring back to Chrystal, the inquest was told.

“It still has the split. I took it off her. Well I asked for it, if I could have it,” Chrystal said.

Bronwyn’s brother Andy Read and his wife Michelle Read at South Cronulla Beach. Michelle says the signet ring has been given to police. Picture: John Feder

Bronwyn’s sister-in-law, Michelle Read, told the podcast that the ring had been given to police.

“We put down every questionable thing that we couldn’t find an answer to. One of them is the signet ring. We think that’s a significant point,” Ms Read said.

Recognising it could be difficult for Chrystal to potentially implicate Mr Winfield, the man she called Dad, deputy state coroner Carl Milovanovich took steps to protect her.

Mr Winfield and his daughter from a previous relationship, Jodie Main, were directed by the coroner to leave the courtroom for her testimony.

Chrystal, at age 19, was the inquest’s youngest witness.

She had told police she heard Bronwyn and Mr Winfield arguing on the night of the disappearance, and remembered her mother crying.

After being sent to bed, Chrystal said she was woken by her stepfather around 1am and bundled into the car with Lauren and the family dog to be driven to Sydney.

It contradicted Mr Winfield’s timeline of driving away from Lennox Head with the girls before 11pm.

Both girls were wondering at the time “what’s going on, where’s Mum”, she said.

Chrystal became distressed and needed a break as she began to ­describe her reluctance to ask her stepfather any awkward ­questions.

Lauren would ask things of Mr Winfield on Chrystal’s behalf, but neither of the girls questioned him about the absence of any photographs of their mother in the house as they grew up.

“I knew that he would let her (Lauren) have anything,” Chrystal said.

“I’d get her to ask ‘oh, you know, we should see if we can get a look at our baby photos’, or something like that. So she would always ask but he’d say ‘oh I don’t know where they are’.”

She also revealed the source of false stories she was told about her mother being a diagnosed schizophrenic who didn’t believe in doctors and didn’t take her medication.

“That was what Jodie told me,” Chrystal said, referring to Mr Winfield’s older daughter, Ms Main.

Contrary to some of the claims advanced about Bronwyn, Chrystal added that she did not see her mother behaving strangely.

“Nothing seemed weird about her at all,” she said.

Her stepfather “got really angry with me” for speaking to police without Ms Main, she added.

“I guess he kind of was thinking that they were twisting our words. When he asked for a copy of my statement and I said I couldn’t find it, he said ‘because I’m worried, ­because I need a copy’.”