The daughter of a camper murdered by a former Jetstar pilot in Victoria’s high country says Gregory Lynn “stole” her mother from her, as prosecutors seek a life sentence over the killing.
Lynn, 57, appeared in the Victorian supreme court on Thursday for a pre-sentencing hearing after a jury in June found him guilty of murdering Carol Clay in 2020. He was acquitted of murdering fellow camper Russell Hill.
Lynn had pleaded not guilty to both murder charges.
Crown prosecutor Daniel Porceddu told the court he would be seeking the maximum penalty of 25 years’ imprisonment for Clay’s murder, which he described as “cold-blooded and callous”.
Reading a victim impact statement, Clay’s daughter, Emma Davies, who refused to use Lynn’s names, told the court that what had occurred to her mother was like a “horror movie”.
“He [Lynn] stole my mother from me. He stole my children’s grandmother. He took her life, he took her dignity and he took her privacy,” Davies said.
“He destroyed all the evidence … he burned her beyond all possible recognition.”
She described Clay as a “phenomenal” person with an infectious laugh who campaigned for women’s rights in her community.
“Her life had been devoted to others,” she said.
“She was a woman of action who rarely stood still. Always knitting and preserving.”
Related: Only Carol Clay’s murderer Greg Lynn knows what really happened to her and her lover Russell Hill
Davies said that writing her victim impact statement was a “harrowing” process that involved wading through the past four and a half years.
Porceddu told the court that Lynn’s offending was a “grave” example of murder and said he showed no remorse. He described an apology that Lynn gave when testifying during the trial as “self-serving.”
He told the court that Lynn’s disposal and burning of the remains of Hill and Clay were aggravating factors that must be considered by justice Michael Croucher in his sentencing.
He said the general deterrence was an important principle in determining Lynn’s sentence.
“Mrs Clay suffered a very violent death,” he said.
Porceddu said Lynn’s burning of evidence left Clay’s family in “anguish” for 20 months as they waited for information about what happened to her.
He told the court it was a serious murder, because Lynn intended to kill Clay and he was driven by a desire to eliminate her as a witness of Hill’s death.
Clay was an older person and “posed no threat to Lynn,” Porceddu added.
Lynn wore the same dark suit, blue shirt and striped silver tie that he wore throughout the trial.
Hill’s wife, Robyn, and one of his daughters, Colleen Turnbull, sat in the courtroom during the hearing on Thursday.
Lynn faces a maximum penalty of 25 years, known as life imprisonment, for murder. This would include the almost three years Lynn has already spent in custody since he was arrested and charged in 2021, the court heard.
The supreme court previously heard Hill, 74, had been camping with 73-year-old Clay, with whom he had been having an affair, when they both died.
In June, after a five-week trial, a jury found Lynn guilty of one murder charge and acquitted him of the other.
Lynn was camping at Bucks Camp, a remote site in the Wonnangatta Valley, when he was joined in the valley by Hill and Clay in March 2020.
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