Teacher’s pet: leave my dad alone, says Chris Dawson’s daughter

The youngest daughter of Chris and Lyn Dawson insists her father is the victim of a “witch hunt”.

‘We’re learning things we’ve never known before’ … Lyn Dawson’s niece Renee Simms at her Neutral Bay home in Sydney. Picture: John Feder

Lyn Dawson’s relatives say they are learning “things we’ve never known before” about her suspected murder, as her youngest daughter separately insists that her father is the victim of a “witch hunt”.

Speaking on behalf of Lyn’s family yesterday, niece Renee Simms said The Australian’s investigative podcast series, The Teacher’s Pet, had tracked down people they did not know existed.

“It’s really bringing the family a lot of hope someone who has the keys will come forward,” she said.

A serving magistrate, Jeff Linden, has spoken on the podcast of a decades-old secret conversation in which he was told that murder suspect Chris Dawson went back to his old property while the new owners were renovating and asked: “Where are you digging?”

The podcast also revealed the view of Mr Dawson’s former schoolgirl lover, Joanne Curtis, that Lyn was buried on the property at Bayview on Sydney’s northern beaches, and her urgings that police “look in the soft soil”.

“The family, while the podcasts are coming out, we’re literally learning things that we’ve never known before. We’re all just absorbing it still,” Ms Simms said in an ­interview with the Today show.

She added the family was “very much hoping” the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions would “have a more thorough look at it, open it up and ultimately charge whoever is responsible for murdering my aunt”.

These comments came as ­Sherryn Dawson — Chris and Lyn’s youngest daughter, who was two when her mother went missing — publicly defended her father.

Two coroners found Mr Dawson murdered his wife. He was not charged and denies killing her.

“It’s a witch hunt on my dad,” Sherryn told the Gold Coast Bulletin. “My dad’s getting hounded because there’s all these people that have got it in for him. Rather than focusing on perhaps that there could be someone else.”

Her older sister, Shanelle, who was four when Lyn went missing, has emphatically rejected the suggestion their mother simply walked out on them. “I don’t believe for a moment that she left us voluntarily and then stayed away all this time,” Shanelle told the podcast.

Sherryn said: “I know (Shanelle has spoken) and she was overseas when we were all getting harassed 10 years ago. She wasn’t the one getting harassed.

“It’s a witch hunt and I’m over it. I’ve got a family I want to focus on.”

She was scathing of Ms Curtis, who was 16 years old when she started a sexual relationship with Mr Dawson, a teacher at her school, Cromer High.

Two days after Lyn went missing, Mr Dawson moved her into the family home and she became stepmother to his two young daughters. Police do not suspect Ms Curtis of any foul play.

Accusing Ms Curtis of trying to damage her father, Sherryn said: “Stepmother was a bitch … she can live with that.”

Ms Simms responded: “I haven’t seen Sherryn for probably 18 years and I guess that’s through her choice. I guess everyone is ­entitled to their own opinion. I have a different opinion.”

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