Lynette Dawson called her husband to say she would not be coming home and had reasons to disappear, with some investigative leads including reported sightings ignored by police, a court has heard.
Christopher Michael Dawson, 73, has pleaded not guilty in the NSW Supreme Court to the murder of his wife, who vanished in January 1982.
Chris Dawson arrives at the NSW Supreme Court on Monday for the second day of his trial.Credit:Nick Moir
The Crown alleges on or about January 8 that year, Dawson, alone or with another person or persons, murdered his wife. It is also alleged he disposed of her body at an unknown location, possibly with assistance.
Opening the defence case on Monday, barrister Pauline David said Dawson may have “failed” Lynette Dawson as her husband, and that they experienced difficulties before she disappeared including his extramarital relationship with a teenager, referred to as JC, “but he did not kill her”.
“It is entirely understandable that her family and those that love her would like an answer,” she said. “However, the answer, the defence say, does not lie in the prosecution of Christopher Dawson and that suggestion that he has murdered his wife is the wrong answer.”
She said Dawson had driven his wife to a bus stop at Mona Vale to go shopping on January 9, 1982, and they had agreed that she would later meet him, their two daughters, her mother Helena Simms and a friend Phillip Day at the Northbridge Baths where Dawson was working that day.
David said at 3pm, a staff member notified Dawson of a phone call and handed the phone to him, where Lynette Dawson allegedly said words to the effect that “she would not be coming to the pool, and she would not be returning home that day”.
She said Dawson had returned to Simms and Day, “where both observed that he was shaken”. The court heard the two witnesses have died.
David said there were subsequent phone calls and bank card transactions, and it was disputed that Lynette Dawson “was deceased at the time”, as alleged by the Crown.
Lynette Dawson called husband to say she wasn’t coming home, court told
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