Arrest Made for 1988 Murder of a Gay Man in Sydney

After 30 years, an arrest for the 1988 murder of a gay man in Australia has come to justice. 

According to Advocate Media, Police in the Australian state of New South Wales have charged 49-year-old man Scott Phillip with the murder of Scott Johnson, an American living in Sydney who was 27 at the time he died on December 8, 1988. 

A Sydney police review of suspicious deaths from the 1970s to 2000 found that at least 27 men were murdered by homophobic attackers during that period.

Scott Johnson originally moved to Australia to be with his partner and was a doctoral student in mathematics at Australian National University in Canberra. His body was found at the foot of a cliff near Manly’s North Headin in Sydney. Phillip did not apply for bail and will next face court in July.

Originally, the death was looked at as a suicide, but Johnson’s brother, Steve Johnson,  eventually called for the case to be re-opened. Steve Johnson said that he “never believed Scott killed himself.” He told Advocate in 2014, “Scott was one of his generation’s brightest academic stars with a promising future. He was out to our family and living happily in Australia with his Australian partner. The day before he went missing, he had received news that he had finished the final proof for his mathematics Ph.D.—a day for celebration, not suicide.”

According to Advocate, A 2012 inquest reversed the original verdict of suicide but left open the possibility that Scott Johnson’s death was accidental. In 2017, the coroner for New South Wales ruled unequivocally that he “died as a result of a gay hate attack.”

Australian authorities offered 1 million Australian dollars (the equivalent of $720,000 in the U.S.) for any information that could help the murder investigation. 

“He courageously lived his life as he wanted to,” Steve Johnson told the AP. “I hope the friends and families of the other dozens of gay men who lost their lives find solace in what’s happened today and hope it opens the door to resolve some of the other mysterious deaths of men who have not yet received justice.” 

The cliff where Scott was killed has been historically known as a gathering place for gay men in the ’80s and ’90s, many of which were pushed or forced off the side, along with being beaten and/or raped in the same spot. After the case was reopened for investigation, the police admitted that the original case was not investigated adequately. 

While Steve Johnson mourns the loss of his brother and his children’s uncle, he hopes that this arrest will provide peace within his family.