Search Dawsons’ soft soil area: NSW magistrate

A magistrate says police should investigate the “soft soil” that was concreted over at the Dawsons’ former home | NEW PODCAST

Magistrate Jeffery Linden at Lismore Courthouse. Picture: Natalie Grono

A serving NSW magistrate says it is vital police look at an area of “soft soil” that was later cemented over at missing Sydney mother Lyn Dawson’s former home as a possible location of her remains.

Jeff Linden said if police had overlooked the area, it should be re-examined in light of her husband and suspected killer Chris Dawson’s visits to the property after selling it.

“I would have thought it was fairly vital to look at that again,” he told The Australian’s investigative podcast series The Teacher’s Pet. “It may not come up with anything but at least, from the family perspective, it’s been done.”

Mr Linden has previously told the series he was working as a northern beaches solicitor when he was visited in late 1987 or early 1988 by Neville Johnston, then the new owner of the Dawsons’ former home, about an unrelated legal matter.

When he told Mr Johnston about Lyn’s disappearance, he saw the “blood drain out of his face”.

Mr Johnston then told him a “chilling” story of how he was renovating when Mr Dawson came to the property and asked: “Where are you digging?”

Mr Johnston said: “If she’s there, she’s under six inches (15cm) of concrete.”

Mr Linden’s latest comments come after he reviewed a transcript of a 1998 police interview in which Mr Johnston told detectives Mr Dawson visited the home uninvited up to three times. “In my mind, it makes it stranger again. Why would you visit a house on two occasions, possibly three, that you had sold to another person some time ago?” he said.

Lyn was living at Bayview on Sydney’s northern beaches with her husband and two young daughters when she vanished in January 1982. Mr Dawson moved teenage lover Joanne Curtis in two days later. He sold the property in 1984 and moved with Ms Curtis to Queensland. The property was sold in 1987 to Mr Johnston and his wife, Sue.

Soon after moving in, the Johnstons cemented over loose soil outside bedrooms once used by the Dawsons’ daughters, to deal with water running into the area from a hill. Years later, they extended the children’s bedrooms over the existing concrete.

Ms Curtis said she thought Lyn was buried on the property and urged police to “look in the soft soil”.

The Australian understands police ruled out the area as a burial location because the renovations would have exposed Lyn’s ­remains if they were there.

Mrs Johnston said, however, the ground was not significantly disturbed during the extension work. “There was no extra concrete put on those little extensions. It was just the original concrete and then just vertical walls have gone on top,” she said.

In his police interview, Mr Johnston played down suspicions about Mr Dawson’s visits and did not mention the question about digging.

Mr Linden said this was “very much” at odds with Mr Johnston’s alarm when first told Lyn was missing and he had pleaded: “For God’s sake, don’t tell my wife or she’ll never live in that house.”

Concreter Joe Cimino has estimated he would have dug only 15cm when he concreted over the “soft soil” area next to the bedrooms. He said another area near the swimming pool was so soft that when digging with a shovel, it was “like I was cutting through cheesecake”.

Mr Dawson denies killing his wife.