Former Jetstar pilot Greg Lynn used his experience as an airline captain to make the quick decision to cover-up the ‘accidental deaths’ of secret lover campers Russell Hill and Carol Clay.
Lynn claimed Ms Clay was dressed in her pyjamas when Mr Hill made the fateful decision to steal his shotgun from the back seat of his Nissan Patrol.
He told the court the ensuing fight for control of the weapon led to the deaths of the elderly couple.
Lynn, 57, has pleaded not guilty in the Supreme Court of Victoria to the murders of Mr Hill, 74, and Ms Clay, 73, in the Wonnangatta Valley, in Victoria’s Alpine region, on March 20, 2020.
On Tuesday, a jury heard Lynn’s account to detectives about how he came up with the plan to cover-up the couple’s alleged murders by using his expertise as a pilot.
Greg Lynn claimed he used his expertise as a pilot to make the quick decision to cover-up the campers’ bodies
The Barathrum shotgun Lynn claims was stolen by Russell Hill.
‘I thought “what am I going to do?” and my business, my profession, is working with decision-making pathways,’ he told police.
‘I mean you might think I made a terrible one here – but quick decisions to try to come to the best outcome, that’s what I do.’
The video recording of Lynn’s police interview showed the former pilot dressed in a grey windcheater, spectacles and surgical mask as he recalled the fateful night police claim he murdered the pair.
Lynn claimed he had been in a deadly fight with Mr Hill as they fought for control of a 12-gauge shotgun when it went off and killed Ms Clay.
Mr Hill was then killed in a fatal tussle after coming at him with a knife, Lynn claimed.
Presented with the bloody aftermath, Lynn said he did what he did to try to hang onto his career in the skies.
‘I tried to save myself,’ Lynn said.
Lynn claimed if he had been a doctor or a tradesman, his actions might have been accepted more readily by police.
Greg Lynn had a licence to carry guns and shoot deer
Detective Sergeant Brett Florence (pictured on Tuesday) was tasked with interviewing Greg Lynn
The former pilot said the incident happened when he was at a high point in his life at home and in his career as a pilot.
‘And so this for me was a disaster and I thought “what else can I possibly do?” and if I covered it up, not so much cover-up [the crime scene], but cover up me. To make me disappear,’ Lynn said.
‘I quickly made this assessment. This is the only one that offered any hope, not guaranteed, any hope of avoiding that.’
Lynn told police he made himself a list of tasks to complete upon leaving the campers’ bodies stashed under a pile of branches.
‘And I set myself about doing it,’ he said. ‘I packed-up, hitched the trailer, packed my camp up, put them in the trailer and then looked around at the evidence.
‘There was no evidence of me being out there now, there was questions about who had seen me there, but I never actually spoke to anyone other than the blackberry sprayers and that was two days prior,’ Lynn said.
‘So I chose that pathway, but it very quickly unravelled at the very first turn.’
The jury has heard Lynn was brought undone by CCTV cameras on the mountain that captured him in the area at the time of the alleged murders.
Carol Clay and Russell Hill had been in a secret relationship when they met Greg Lynn in the remote wilderness
The deadly struggle allegedly took place at the front of Mr Hill’s Landcruiser (pictured)
Data from his and the campers’ phones would also point police in his direction.
The jury heard detectives travelled to Lynn’s property in July that year where they observed his Nissan Patrol had changed colours from what they had observed on the CCTV at the time of the alleged murders.
But he was free to return to the scene of the crime in November where Lynn incinerated what was left of the couple’s bodies.
Lynn claimed he set fire to the bodies using a small amount of kerosene and firewood, burning their corpses throughout the night until nothing remained by shattered remains.
The jury heard Lynn’s first contact with Mr Hill had been a ‘jovial affair’ despite him camping in close proximity to his own campsite along the river in a location known as Bucks Camp.
Things went sour the following day when Lynn claimed Mr Hill began filming him with his drone.
Russell Hill’s antics with a drone indirectly led to his own demise, Greg Lynn claimed
The charred remains of Russell Hill’s campsite after Lynn set it alight
Lynn told police Mr Hill had accused him of hunting too close to camp and told him he planned to take the drone footage he had captured to police.
Tensions escalated later that night after Lynn claimed to have annoyed Mr Hill by turning up the volume on his car stereo.
On Tuesday, the jury heard new details on how Lynn claimed the elderly couple spent their last moments alive.
Lynn claimed Ms Clay was dressed in her pyjamas when Mr Hill made the fateful decision to steal his shotgun from the back seat of his Nissan Patrol.
Lynn claimed Ms Clay pleaded with Mr Hill to drop the gun as he attempted to disarm him.
‘Stop it Russell,’ she allegedly yelled.
Crouched in front of the couple’s tent, she would be shot in the head and killed instantly by Mr Hill, Lynn claimed.
The jury heard Lynn had become engaged in a deadly struggle for the loaded shotgun, which was carrying ammunition designed to swiftly kill a full sized deer.
Lynn told police he had been looking Mr Hill in the eye when he pulled the trigger.
Moments earlier, Lynn claimed to have pleaded with Mr Hill to drop the shotgun.
‘I told him to give it back to me, he refused. he cocked it and he let one go – not at me, just over my head, so I was scared sh*tless,’ Lynn later told police.
The jury heard Mr Hill took the shotgun and loaded it after becoming enraged at the volume of Lynn’s car stereo.
Lynn told police the shot fired by Russell Hill in a deadly struggle blew off the side mirror of his Landcruiser (pictured) and struck Carol Clay in the head
Greg Lynn changed the colour of his dark-coloured Nissan Patrol (pictured on CCTV the night after the alleged murders) to a tan colour using paint from his garage and a roller
Lynn told police he had turned-up his stereo to annoy Mr Hill after their previous confrontation about the drone.
‘He’s trying to have fun in bed and I was playing the music up loud and he’s lost his temper,’ Lynn said.
Gripped in the face-to-face struggle with the angry camper, Lynn told police he could not drop the gun and run.
‘I thought that I might be about to be shot in the back if I made a run for it,’ he said.
The trial continues.
