Police eye on William Tyrrell’s foster carers

New pictures of William show desperate last push by police to solve the case.

A picture released on Tuesday shows the white spider printed on the back of the Spider-Man suit William Tyrrell was wearing the day of his disappearance.

NSW police have been combing over statements given by William Tyrrell’s foster parents as they try to solve the mystery of the boy’s disappearance.

Dozens of sensitive documents related to the case were released by the NSW Coroner on Tuesday in a last-ditch effort to encourage witnesses to come forward.

The documents show senior police returning in February this year to a fire trail where William’s foster father was seen by police on September 12, 2014, the day the boy vanished.

One document notes the foster father had defied a police direction to stay at the property at 48 Benaroon Drive in Kendall on the NSW mid-north coast, where William was last seen alive.

“Sometime after the disappearance of William Tyrrell, the MFC (male foster carer) was seen by Senior Constable (Christopher) Rowley in the fire trail at the end of Benaroon Drive, Kendall,” the document says. “The MFC had ­ignored the advice from police to remain at 48 Benaroon Drive.

“On Monday 03/02/2020 Senior Constable Rowley met with Detective (Mark) Dukes and took him to this location. Senior Constable Rowley indicated the accuracy was within about 50 metres of the original sighting.”

The foster father has testified that he searched frantically for the boy up and down local fire trails. He is not considered a suspect.

The Coroner also released a photograph showing, for the first time, the bright white spider on the back of the Spider-Man suit William was wearing when he went missing. The fact that the suit had a white spider on the back was for years kept secret from the public, as one detail only the abductor would know.

William was just three, and dressed in the Spider-Man suit, when he went missing from outside a three-bedroom house on a bush block at 48 Benaroon Drive, Kendall, on the NSW mid-north. He was in foster care at the time.

NSW Coroner Harriet Grahame has been inquiring into his disappearance for almost two years.

Other documents released on Tuesday include a statement that suggests police could not corroborate evidence given by William’s foster mother, who has testified that she saw two strange cars in the street on that September morning. Detective Sergeant Laura Beacroft’s statement says: “There is no evidence to suggest the foster mother’s involvement in any crime.”

A separate statement suggests a near-neighbour on Benaroon Drive, Paul Savage, was unable to account for all his movements on the morning William disappeared.

The documents reveal the lengths to which police went to test the alibi of Mr Savage, whose account of his movements is described as “odd”.

“He went searching on his own, stated he got lost in terrain he might have expected to be familiar with and he did not report the outcome of his searching,” it says.

“There are periods of time where Mr Savage’s movements cannot be corroborated.”

Police came up with a strategy by which they would bury a ­Spider-Man suit, similar to the one worn by William on the day of his disappearance, on a bush trail near Mr Savage’s house, to see what he might do when he saw it.

A newly released statement from Detective Senior Constable Louise Currey says that, on day one of the operation, Mr Savage “bent over and looked at a Spider-Man suit lying next to the dirt track” and then continued walking. Mr Savage has said he did not see the suit, and was only looking at “something white”.

The following day, he saw the suit and ran back to his house to report that matter to the police.

The newly released documents show the investigation swinging toward local sex offender Frank Abbott, who was living in a rundown caravan at Herons Creek, about 11km away, when William disappeared.

The Coroner has released transcripts of several phone conservations between Abbott and his parish priest. They talk about the case but Abbott makes no admissions. He has always denied wrongdoing.

Abbott has been watching the inquest from his prison cell, where he is serving time for sex crimes. It is not yet clear whether he will ­testify.

The coronial inquiry is due to resume in October.