A woman who met Chris Dawson and his brother Paul at a party described the twins as having a ‘creepy’ closeness

At a gathering in 2007, a woman who met accused wife killer Chris Dawson and his brother Paul described the twins as having a ‘creepy’ closeness.

Fay Sinclair, a witness at Dawson’s trial for the murder of his wife Lyn, said he always double-checked with his older twin Paul before speaking.

On Monday, the trial heard of an alleged sighting of Lyn Dawson during Prince Charles and Princess Diana’s 1983 royal visit, as well as a threat by schoolgirl babysitter JC to ‘get rid of’ Lynette.

Christopher Michael Dawson, 73, is accused of killing his wife in January 1982 and disposing of her body so he could have an unrestricted relationship with the babysitter. He has entered a not guilty plea.

Ms Sinclair said she was at Phil Day’s ‘living wake,’ which was attended by his former classmates and Sydney Boys High School prefects, including her husband John and the Dawson twins, who were dying of cancer.

The witness claimed she was talking to Chris Dawson about her failed previous marriage and asked if he’d had one as well. ‘His wife had left him to join a commune or something like in the Blue Mountains,’ he explained.

Chris’s twin brother Paul had ‘came over and sat next to him very close’ at that time, she added, and she asked whether they had children.

She responded, “What kind of mother would leave her children?” when he confirmed that they had.

She claimed Chris didn’t answer other than to ‘glance at his brother,’ and it was Paul who responded with “something along the lines of “she was a little bit crazy,”‘ according to her.

Ms Sinclair, a recruiter who has interviewed thousands of job hopefuls, described the twins’ body language as ‘weird… presumably because of how close they were sitting to one another.’

‘My interpretation was that Chris was looking to Paul to validate that what he was about to say was appropriate,’ she claimed on Monday while being cross-examined by Chris Dawson’s lawyer, Greg Walsh.

‘I believe Chris was double-checking with his older twin to be sure what he was saying was correct.’

The murder trial in the NSW Supreme Court was given a video of Elva McBay’s 2018 appearance via video link at a Local Court hearing, as well as footage from Prince Charles and Princess Diana’s 1983 royal trip of Sydney.

 

Fay Sinclair said Chris and Paul Dawson were unusually close and that she found that 'creepy' after meeting them together at a 'living wake' for one of the twins fellow former Sydney Boys High School classmates

Ms McBay, who was about 99 years old when she appeared in court in 2018, had been a supporter of the Newtown Jets rugby league team, originally the ‘Blue Bags,’ since she was about three years old in about 1922.

She met Paul Dawson when he was a teacher at Kogarah High School, and once the twins started playing for her beloved Newtown Jets, she became a close family friend of both Paul and Chris Dawson and their wives.

Lynette Dawson was seen more than a year after she vanished, exactly as the royals drove along Macquarie Street and her husband greeted Prince Charles, according to Ms McBay.

On March 28, 1983, she was immediately in front of the barrier outside Sydney Hospital when ‘a lady came from behind, I believe she came from the hospital… about the time Charles and Diana approached us.’

‘She was in a rush, so she pushed in about six or eight people ahead of me and ducked under the barricade, and the motorbike cops were almost up to us when it happened,’ she explained.

‘She swiftly turned to observe where the procession was going, and I caught a glimpse of her face for a few seconds before running straight in front of the motorcyclists.’

“I suppose that’s Lyn Dawson,” I told my spouse. I’m sure I saw the lady’s face but can’t recall it. I told Paul and Chris about seeing the person I assumed was Lyn at some point.’

The Newtown Jet s fan Elva McBay who befriended the Dawson twins and their wives described the accused as 'placid, good fun, an absolutely wonderful father and husband (who) adored his children and Lyn' (above Lyn and Chris together)

Ms McBay claimed she attended Lyn Dawson’s elder daughter’s fourth birthday celebration six months before she vanished in July 1981.

When Ms McBay went into the kitchen at noon, she discovered Lyn in tears, having had a disagreement with the teen girl babysitter who had recently moved into the family’s Bayview home.

‘She was inconsolably upset, crying and trembling.’ I’d never seen her in such a bad mood before.

‘I asked, ‘What’s the matter, Lyn?’ “I had the most horrible quarrel with (JC) this morning, she wants to get rid of me,” she explained.

“Oh Lyn, you can’t be damaged by this,” I said, “but you should get her out of the house before there’s any more trouble,” she responded, “and my mother has said the same thing.”

‘She was getting the party ready, so I lingered in the kitchen for a bit before returning to the kids.’

Mrs McBay stated that she had ‘heard they’d removed a small girl from the school’ and that she did not approve of the situation, which she ‘thought was quite weird.’

‘I said if she annoys you as much as this Lyn, you should get her out of the house,’ she told the court. ‘Her mother had suggested the same thing.’

Ms McBay said she had “no recollection” of Lynette telling her JC “threatened to murder her” when questioned by Mr Dawson’s counsel, Phillip Boulten, SC, at the 2018 hearing.

Ms McBay, on the other hand, agreed that a handwritten statement – in which she did say so, according to Mr Boulten – had a signature on the bottom that she could just make out with a magnifying glass as her own.

Chris Dawson, she said, was “quite quiet, very tranquil, terrific fun,” and “an absolutely fantastic parent and husband (who) cherished his children and Lyn.”

On Wednesday, Ian ‘Speed’ Kennedy, a legendary former investigator, testified about an allegation that he told Chris Dawson in the 1980s that Lyn was fine and living in New Zealand.

Mr Kennedy, who served in the NSW Police Force for 35 years and is best known for apprehending the men who killed beauty queen and nurse Anita Cobby in 1986, was in the same Sydney Boy High class as the Dawson twins, who graduated in 1965.

Mr Kennedy was informed of Chris Dawson’s claim to detectives looking into Lyn Dawson’s disappearance.

Lynette Dawson was 'trembling and crying' at the fourth birthday party of her elder daughter after a row with the babysitter JC who Lyn told her had threatend 'to get rid of' Lyn

Chris Dawson informed the authorities. At a 1985 Sydney Boys High School reunion, Mr Kennedy informed him that he (Kennedy) had verified that Lyn was living in New Zealand and doing well.

Detectives questioned Dawson about this in a 1991 videotaped police interview, which was presented at the trial, and Mr Kennedy denied ever telling Dawson this.

In that interview, Dawson answers this by implying that the investigator was too inebriated to recall their chat.

Mr Kennedy claimed on Monday that he never had any knowledge about the Lynette Dawson case and that if he did, there would be a record of it.

At the reunion, he denied having the talk with Chris Dawson.

‘I reject being affected by alcohol…’ he replied in response to the idea that he was too drunk to remember the event. I had nothing to do with Lyn Dawson’s investigation.

The murder trial began in early May and is now in its sixth week, with the Crown case expected to conclude on Friday or early the following week.
The Crown’s witnesses have attempted to portray Dawson as an aggressive, controlling, and abusive husband, with testimony revealing that Ms Dawson had a black eye and bruises on her arms and thigh, among other things.

Witnesses said they saw him smash his wife’s face into the dirt, swing her into a doorframe, and call her “fatso.”

Lyn left their marriage of her own free will and abandoned her two young girls, then aged four and two, according to Dawson’s defense.

His defence team stated that the witnesses’ testimony was tainted because they discussed the issue with one another and listened to The Teacher’s Pet podcast, which was broadcast with the assumption that her husband was guilty.

They further claimed that police had tunnel vision concerning Chris Dawson’s alleged culpability and refused to investigate the possibility that Lyn Dawson was still alive.

Dawson believes that JC’s assertions are lies motivated by a harsh custody struggle following their 1990 break-up.