Lynette Dawson’s brother held it together for a full two minutes when he thanked the media, prosecutors and the judge on the steps of the NSW Supreme Court after her husband was found guilty of her murder. But there came a moment when his voice thickened.
“We would also like to remember the people who loved her but are not here to see this judgment,” Greg Simms said. “In particular my mum and dad, Helena and Len Simms, and my brother [Phillip], who passed away only 18 months ago.”
Chris Dawson, Helena Simms (Lynette’s mother) and Lynette Dawson; Inset, Helena Simms’ diary.
Helena died in 2001, the same year that a coroner found Lynette had been murdered and recommended that police lay charges against “a known person” – a course of action the Director of Public Prosecutions then declined to adopt, citing a lack of evidence.
Helena was not entirely absent from this year’s trial. Her voice threaded the evidence through her prolific diary entries, which chronicled Lyn’s misery as Chris rejected her in favour of their teenage babysitter, given the court pseudonym JC. Later, the misery was her own.
Tuesday 6 October, 1981: Over to Mona Vale to meet Chris + 2 children. [JC] there too. Lyn shopping … Chris comforting [JC] on bed in study.
Wednesday 7 October, 1981: Lyn to work. [JC] to school with Chris. [JC] has problems and is Chris’s shadow! Lyn home very unhappy almost in tears about Chris. I weeded the garden etc. Home looks ‘unloved’.
The trial heard that JC began babysitting for the Dawsons in 1980 and moved into their home amid her own family troubles in October 1981. Chris developed what Justice Ian Harrison described as a “possessive infatuation” with JC. Lyn told one friend she had come home once to find JC naked in the swimming pool and Chris elsewhere in the house. Another said Lyn felt Chris had lost interest in her.
Lyn was more circumspect with the information she gave to her mother, but Helena’s diary entries and letters, in which she relayed family news, indicated her growing awareness of Lyn’s situation.
Towards the end of 1981, Chris made several attempts to leave his wife and move in with JC, including once getting almost as far as Queensland. He packed all his clothes and his pillow, leaving a note for Lyn that asked her not to paint too dark a picture of him to the girls. But JC became homesick over Christmas and they returned to Sydney. Dawson “uncharacteristically” gave up Christmas with his family, the judge said, and also spent New Year’s Eve with JC.
Helena wrote to Lyn’s older sister, Pat Jenkins: “Saddest Xmas I’ve had. Lyn wants Chris to go see the doc … I think, to see what is making him so angry with her.”
Thursday, 31 December, 1981: To Jenny and David’s New Year Party. Home 2.30am. Chris off on his own on yacht party! Refused to take Lyn & 2 girls to see the yacht.
Pat said Helena asked her to destroy the diaries before she died. She kept them but didn’t read them. “Maybe there was information that was important … and they should go to the police,” she told the court.
On the last day of Lyn’s life, Chris agreed to go with her to marriage counselling, and by the time he dropped her back at work that afternoon, they were holding hands. She told her colleague Sue Strath that the counselling session had been “really positive”.
Friday, 8 January, 1982: Rang Lyn, sounded half sozzled said all was well.
It was the last time Helena spoke to her 33-year-old daughter.
The next news came from Chris as he spun the first silk in a web of lies torn down this week. He claimed to have dropped Lyn off at a Mona Vale bus stop on January 9 before she called him at the Northbridge Baths about 3pm to say she needed time away. Helena was there.
Sunday, 10 January, 1982: Didn’t sleep all night … Chris rang. Lyn rang him not coming home … Lyn to ring me Wednesday.
Wednesday, 13 January: Overcast. For swim, beaut in water, rained … Lyn didn’t phone as promised – upset!
She told police, in a handwritten letter later that year, that Chris had appeared “visibly affected” following the apparent first call.
“It was an STD call from Lyn saying she needed some days to sort things out, was on the Central Coast with friends (no idea who it could have been) was alright,” Helena wrote.
In his judgment, Harrison said further calls Dawson claimed to have received were “bereft … of any content beyond trite references” regarding her absence.
He said it was “simply absurd” that if marital problems had caused Lyn to abandon her home, Chris would have been the only person she called in subsequent weeks.
The judge described Helena’s contribution to the trial as “somewhat extraordinarily documented” in her writings, providing “what might be characterised as a real-time commentary on the events as she perceived them at the time”.
Harrison was satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that Lyn had never telephoned Chris after January 8, and there was “no truth” to his representations.
Greg Simms said it had never made sense to the family.
“We’ve always said that she wouldn’t have left those two children,” Simms said. “And [the] first person she would’ve contacted would’ve been my mother. There is no bones about that at all.
“It would’ve been Mum first, if she was in trouble … Mum would’ve said ‘come home, come to Clovelly’.”
In days and decades to follow, Helena kept wondering. Now the family has a conviction, but still no Lyn.
Wednesday 20 January: No news of Lyn.
Saturday 23 January: No word of Lyn.
Friday 29 January: Chris rang no word.
Sunday 31 January: Chris rang no news.
Sunday 28 February: No NEWS.
Sunday 9 May: No word from LYN!
Wednesday 23 June: cold day but sunny. Off early to check out LD. A wasted day, not Lyn. Really deflated + sad.
Sunday 31 October: C arrived with 10 bags of Lyn’s clothes. Devastated!
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