Top cop ‘gun shy’ on podcast investigations following ‘Teacher’s Pet’ success
The ‘huge battle’ to understand Stewart John Regan’s terrifying reputation has been met with resistance by police more than once | NEW EPISODE
Police told the family of murdered gangster Stewart John Regan they wouldn’t release the files relating to his homicide because they were concerned their investigation would be compromised by publicity from a podcast like The Teacher’s Pet.
Regan was assassinated in Sydney’s inner west in 1974 at the height of his short but prolific criminal career. His murder has never been solved and the NSW Unsolved Homicide Squad will not formally reopen the investigation.
Unsolved Homicide is the same unit at the centre of The Australian’s investigative podcast series Bronwyn – where relatives of missing woman Bronwyn Winfield say they are frustrated at police’s unwillingness to share information.
It is also the unit that launched an investigation into the 1982 disappearance of Lynette Simms after The Australian’s podcast The Teacher’s Pet revealed she had been murdered by husband Christopher Michael Dawson.
The Teacher’s Pet was invoked as a reason not to share information with the family by Unsolved Homicide boss Detective Inspector Nigel Warren, according to Stewart John Regan’s cousin Kelly Slater Regan.
She is collaborating with The Australian on an investigative podcast, The Gangster’s Ghost, which has revealed new evidence about Regan’s life and violent death.
“[Warren] said, ‘We’re a bit gun shy giving out information, because there was a podcast where the next of kin did a podcast on Lynette Dawson,” Kelly Slater told senior reporter Matthew Condon in a new episode of The Gangster’s Ghost.
Dawson was arrested in late 2018 – less than a year after The Teacher’s Pet Podcast thrust Lynette’s unsolved disappearance into the spotlight – and convicted of the crime in mid-2022. He is currently serving a 24-year sentence and has applied for leave to appeal his conviction in the High Court of Australia.
He has always maintained he played no role in his wife’s disappearance and claims he suffered a forensic disadvantage in proving his innocence due to the long delay in bringing charges.
During her mid-2021 phone call with the top cop, Kelly Slater said Warren explained that the investigation into Regan’s death is still open and due for review every five to 10 years.
“He said, ‘Look, [homicide investigations are] never closed’,” Kelly said.
“And I said, “So when was the review done?’ And he said, ‘Well, we did an investigation into the death in 2004, and then in 2016, the matters were reviewed again’ … And I said, ‘Well, nobody from my family was contacted’.”
Kelly and Regan’s de facto wife, Margaret Yates, met with Warren and other members of the Unsolved Homicide Unit in Parramatta later in 2022. It was the first time Margaret had disclosed anything about her relationship with the notorious gangster to police.
NSW Police told The Australian a review into Johnny Regan’s 1974 murder was finalised in 2025, at which point it was concluded that there is insufficient evidence to justify a reinvestigation at this point in time.
“The case remains open under State Crime Command’s Homicide Squad Unsolved Homicide Team, where it continues to be actively monitored for any new information or evidence that could assist in advancing the investigation,” a representative said.
“Police remain committed to providing regular updates to the victim’s family, whilst also ensuring the integrity of the investigation is preserved and that no potential future investigative avenues are compromised.”
Kelly Regan has been on a years-long crusade to gain access to the documents – believed to fill 10 boxes – that could finally solve Regan’s murder, and had already obtained his criminal history and consorting cards from NSW Police by the time she met Warren in Parramatta in 2022. It was a tough slog.
A Freedom of Information request filed a year earlier, in 2021, bounced around NSW Police for months before access to Regan’s purportedly sizeable criminal history was granted in September. If only they could find it.
Kelly was told the file was unable to be located in police archives – an idea she found unbelievable, given Regan was a person of interest in multiple murders – and a thorough search could run into the thousands of dollars. It was a cost she was prepared to bear.
The former police officer knew Regan’s criminal history existed because she’d found it on microfilm before she left the force.
An expert archivist was brought in by the Unsolved Homicide Unit after Kelly raised her concerns about the apparent mismanagement of files relating to one of Sydney’s most-feared criminals with the former NSW Police Commissioner Mick Fuller.
She finally received the criminal record – which was located attached to another matter – by email in late November of that year.
“There’s some interesting stuff in there: a lot of stealing, a lot of traffic offences, [but] absolutely no charges for murder,” Kelly said, noting charges for rape and several dropped charges were also recorded in the file.
“When I embarked on this, there was no way I thought it would take months and months and months to find one of Sydney’s most notorious criminal’s … history.”
With her assistance, Kelly’s father, Lyndsay Regan, also requested access to coronial documents in 2021 – more than three decades after an inquest was held at the NSW State Coroner’s Court in Lidcombe.
The family knew more than 100 people were interviewed by counsel assisting the coroner in 1977, and ballistic reports and bank and real estate records, as well as statutory declarations made by Regan, had been provided to the court by police.
It was “a huge battle”: the Regans completed the mountains of paperwork and provided birth, death and marriage certificates to identify Lyndsay as a senior next of kin.
In December of that year, they received a copy of threadbare file stored in the NSW State Archive: “It’s two pages, for Christ’s sake,” Kelly said. “That’s it. That’s the whole document.”
In early 2022, Kelly approached the former NSW MP Stephanie Cooke and former state Attorney-General Mark Speakman for assistance in locating the missing files.
Mr Speakman – who is now the NSW state Opposition leader – warned the Regans it could take up to 12 months for the application to be processed.
“This time frame is required as applicants for archived coronial files are not the court’s core business, which is the administration of current deaths,” Mr Speakman wrote.
He said the 1977 coronial inquest documents predated the department’s digital system and the physical copies were stored at the NSW State Archives.
“Despite extensive searches, no further documents have been able to be located,” Mr Speakman wrote.
Kelly said she felt “brushed off”, but continued “prodding” for answers.
Then, in early July of that year, things started looking up.
“I wanted to let you know that documents comprising the file have been located, and I am now moving through the process for the Coroner to consider the application,” a representative of the NSW Coroner’s Court wrote in an email.
“They will take into account any view of the [NSW Police] Unsolved Homicide Unit in relation to the release of documents.”
But correspondence received just a day later was less optimistic.
“It appears the file was retrieved at some previous time in the past, along with some other files, and then refiled with another/other files instead of being returned to its correct location,” the representative wrote.
“I’m sorry to sound vague, but as this predates our digital computer records, it’s difficult to provide really accurate details.”
A few weeks later, the errant files having apparently been retrieved, NSW State Coroner Teresa O’Sullivan approved the request.
“I am writing to let you know that your father’s application for access to the coronial records into the death of Stewart Regan has been approved,” a representative wrote.
“I’m therefore attaching herewith documents relating to this file, consisting of 17 individual components.”
It’s not clear how the missing files were misplaced or where they were located.
Still missing were the statutory declarations made by Johnny Regan prior to his death and tabled at the inquest. When Kelly inquired about their whereabouts, she was told the “documents were released as per the decision of the State Coroner”.
In spite of the gaps, Kelly Regan described it as the “mother lode”: finally in her possession was dozens of witness statements, and although some were heavily redacted, she was able to piece the information together using archival newspaper reports.
“I’m grateful to those that helped us get there,” she said. “Obviously, they’ve gone through a hell of a lot of boxes, and these errors don’t just happen.”
Subscribers hear new episodes first. Hear Episode 3 of The Gangster’s Ghost on Apple and Spotify now. Subscribers get Episodes 5 exclusively at gangstersghost.com.au
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