Steve Johnson and his sisters, Terry, left, and Rebecca and his wife Rosemarie, second from right, arrive at Sydney Supreme Court on Monday for Scott’s murder trial Johnson – Steve, Terry and Rebecca’s sister.
Rick Rycroft / AP
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Steve Johnson and his sisters, Terry, left, and Rebecca and his wife Rosemarie, second from right, arrive at Sydney Supreme Court on Monday for Scott’s murder trial Johnson – Steve, Terry and Rebecca’s sister.
CANBERRA, Australia – An Australian man was sentenced to 12 years and seven months in prison on Tuesday for the 1988 murder of an American man who fell on a Sydney rock mass known as a gay meeting place.
The death of mathematician Scott Johnson was initially called suicide, but his family insisted that more research be done. The 2017 investigator found several attacks, some fatal, in which the victims were targeted because they were thought to be homosexuals.
Scott White, 51, pleaded guilty in January and could have been sentenced to life in prison.
Judge Helen Wilson stated that she could not find any evidence that the murder was a criminal offense against gay hatred, a serious misdemeanor that could have led to a lengthy sentence. He also said he used simpler judgment methods in the New South Wales area in the late 1980s.
He must spend at least eight years and three months in prison before he can be considered parole.
White was 18 years old and homeless when he met 27-year-old Johnson who was born in Los Angeles at a bar in downtown Manly in December 1988 and took him to a nearby rocky North Head.
A former White woman, Helen White, told police in 2019 that her ex-husband was proud to beat up gay men and said the only righteous man was a dead man.
She told the court on Monday that her husband had told her that Johnson had fled the rock. Scott White told police he too was a homosexual and feared that his brother, who hated homosexuals, would find out.
Wilson said it was impossible to reach any conclusions without doubting what had happened on the rock.
“The offender hit Dr. Johnson, causing him to stumble back and off the edge of a cliff,” Wilson said.
“In those moments when he must have realized what was happening to him, Dr. Johnson must have been terrified, knowing he was going to hit the rocks below and realizing his fate,” Wilson he added. “It was a terrible disease.”
Wilson did not accept the lawyers’ argument that Helen White had been encouraged to report her salary to the police.
In an interview on Monday, Helen White denied knowing about the $ 1 million Australian ($ 704,000) bribe for information about Johnson’s murder when she went to the police in 2019., Steve Johnson, o doubled that number by 2020.
White had a record of violent crime before and after the assassination but had not committed a crime since 2008.
“It should be understood that the court does not convict a violent and careless young man for an attack on a gay man,” Wilson said.
“As a result of the passage of time, the offender is no longer the angry young man who raised his fists at each other on the rocky border. “Some evidence is too weak to support that,” Wilson added.
