Bronwyn Winfield’s eldest daughter urged police to investigate her mother’s disappearance

Bronwyn Winfield’s eldest daughter was so concerned about her mum’s whereabouts that she desperately reached out to police and asked them not to tell her father she’d been to see them.

Chrystal Winfield, left, wanted police to investigate her mother's disappearance; top right, with Bronwyn on her first birthday; Chrystal asked police not to tell her father, Jon, bottom right, about her statement.

The eldest daughter of missing mother Bronwyn Winfield was so concerned about her mum’s whereabouts that she desperately reached out to police and asked them not to tell her father she’d been to see them.

In July 1999 Chrystal Winfield was a 16-year-old schoolgirl living in Ballina, just south of Lennox Head on the NSW far north coast, when she learned from relatives and articles she read in the local newspaper that police were reinvestigating her mother’s disappearance more than six years earlier.

Chrystal decided to offer a statement to police and urged them to conduct a “thorough ­investigation” into Bronwyn’s vanishing.

She told them that on the night Bronwyn went missing she had heard her mother and father, Jon Winfield, arguing and that her mother had been “crying”. Chrystal said she couldn’t recall what they were saying to each other but could tell they were fighting, right up until she fell asleep.

Chrystal as a child with Bronwyn.

“I don’t know what has happened to my mother and I am unsure if dad has any involvement in her disappearance,” Chrystal said in her statement. “I know that dad has not wanted me to speak to the police about the disappearance of my mother but I have felt compelled to come to the police station as I want to know what happened to her. I have been very concerned … and would like the police to conduct a thorough investigation to try to find out what has happened to her.”

But she added: “I would ­rather the police not tell my ­father that I have been into the police station or have made this statement.”

Details of the then teenager’s statement come in the wake of a bombshell witness account from a former Lennox Head neighbour of the Winfields. Judy Singh told The Australian’s Bronwyn podcast last week that on the night Bronwyn disappeared she saw Jon drive slowly past her house in an ­adjacent street with what ­appeared to be a body wrapped in a sheet in the back seat of his Ford Falcon.

Ms Singh recalled that the interior light of the car was turned on and that she briefly locked eyes with Mr Winfield.

Late last week the revelations prompted NSW cold-case homicide detectives to immediately seek contact with Ms Singh. She had reported her sighting twice to police over the decades but nothing was done. A NSW police spokesman on Sunday refused to say if investigators had spoken to Ms Singh.

Bronwyn, 31, disappeared from the family home in Sandstone Crescent on Sunday, May 16, 1993. At the time she was separated from Jon and had sought legal advice on child custody and marital assets.

Chrystal was then only 10. Her sister Lauren was five. For two months Bronwyn and the girls had been living in a rented flat in Lennox during the marriage breakdown. Bronwyn then decided to move back into the Sandstone Crescent house with the children while Jon was working in Sydney. They had only been in the house for a couple of days when he flew back from Sydney and confronted her.

During her interview with police, Chrystal was asked what she remembered about that night in Sandstone Crescent. “I have a recollection of my father coming into the house and speaking to my mother,” she said.

“I remember my mother saying something like, ‘What are you doing here?’ I remember mum and dad were talking about unpaid bills and mum saying something along the lines about not talking about it in front of Lauren and myself.

“The next thing I remember was mum telling myself and my sister Lauren to clean our teeth and go to bed. After I went to bed I heard mum and dad arguing in the kitchen. I could hear mum crying at the same time … I could hear them arguing until I must have fell (sic) asleep.”

Mr Winfield later told police that on that Sunday night his wife had decided she needed time out from the children, walked out of the house and was picked up by a person unknown and driven away. Mr Winfield then packed Chrystal and Lauren into the family’s white Ford Falcon and drove them through the night to Sydney, where both Bronwyn and he had relatives. Bronwyn was never heard from again.

A teenage Chrystal, desperate for answers, attended Ballina police station accompanied by one of her teachers from the local Southern Cross High School.

Chrystal told Detective Sergeant Glenn Taylor – who had prompted the reinvestigation – that she had come to the police “of my own free will” and that she understood her statement “may be given to the coroner to assist any future inquiry”.

The statement included her recollection of being driven to Sydney by her father late on that fateful Sunday evening years earlier. In the car, Lauren “asked dad where mum was”. Chrystal remembered her father “saying something about mum going on a holiday”. “Mum was always close to us, she would often hug and cuddle us, and she would always come in and give us a kiss goodnight and tell us that she loved us,” she told police.

“To me it would be out of character for mum to leave and not say goodbye to us if she was going on a holiday without us. I don’t ever recall mum leaving myself or Lauren for any length of time. I feel sure that if mum intended to go on a holiday without us she would have let us know.”

In her statement Chrystal also laid bare her parents’ relationship. “Dad sometimes has a bad temper and can lose control. I have seen my father hit my mother on rare occasions,” she said.

“I remember that mum and dad had been having an argument and dad lost control and he hit mum across the face with an open hand. Mum would just start crying.

“Dad would sometimes lose his temper with myself and Lauren. I remember that he would smack Lauren or myself and on one occasion he picked me up and threw me against the wall.

“Dad always liked the house to be kept spotlessly clean and he would get upset if we made any mess in the house.”

Mr Taylor, now retired and living in Ballina, said he vividly recalled Chrystal coming into the police station to make her statement. “She was a very bright, intelligent girl,” he said. “I really did feel for her.

“We interviewed 70 people about Bronwyn. Every single person … not one person said anything other than she was a tremendous mother. Absolutely adored the children. Wouldn’t even let them go out the front gate without her being there. Watched and protected them and looked after them. Then all of a sudden she’s not there.”

Mr Winfield has always strenuously denied any involvement in the disappearance of Bronwyn. He has never been charged in relation to the case of his missing wife.

Do you know something about this case? Contact Hedley Thomas confidentially at [e-mail]

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