It wasn’t uncommon for campers to stop and chat to Robert Williams as he sprayed blackberries along tracks in the Victorian alpine region.
When a LandCruiser sped toward him just before lunch on a Friday in March 2020, he stepped to the side of the track ready for a friendly conversation.
But the “grumpy old bugger” in his 70s “put his foot down, (and) zoomed past” without even waving.
When news came later that Melbourne couple Russell Hill and Carol Clay had been reported missing, Williams immediately recognised the grumpy man and his “decked out” LandCruiser.
He recounted the interaction in Melbourne Magistrates Court on Monday, where former airline pilot Greg Lynn is facing charges of murdering the couple.
Lynn, now 56, has pleaded not guilty to killing them on that Friday, March 20.
Two days earlier Williams had stopped and spoken to a man in his 50s.
The “creepy fella” was sweating, dressed in a single, shorts and gators, as he got out of a white Prado and asked for the best spot to camp, Williams said.
He later saw the Prado parked at a campsite, backed into the bush with only the bull bar sticking out.
“I thought it looked like he was hiding,” he said.
It’s in that spot that he saw the missing campers head, Williams later told police.
But he wasn’t sure if the creepy man was still there.
Two other moments stood out to Williams from that work trip.
After knocking off work about 5pm on the Friday he was circled by a drone while on the phone to his boss.
Williams waved as it filmed him and it circled above him several times.
He watched it as it hovered over and around several campsites for 35 or 40 minutes, before he lost sight of it near Wonnangatta Cemetery.
Read Related Also: Kelly Brook stuns in pink velvet suit as she’s spotted with Big Narstie in London while filming advert for diet brand
He didn’t see who was operating it, but thought it was rude.
“You’re going down there to have a peaceful camp and somebody’s flying a drone over top of you,” he told the court.
The following morning he smelled burning plastic in the air. It wasn’t uncommon for campers to burn their rubbish, he said, and he only took note to make sure it wasn’t one of his workers doing the wrong thing. It wasn’t.
Hill and Clay’s burnt-out campsite and abandoned vehicle were found on March 7, a week after they last communicated with a friend via high-frequency radio.
Their bodies were discovered in bushland outside Dargo in November 2021, several days after Lynn’s November 22 arrest while camping at Arbuckle Junction.
Lynn is facing a five-day committal hearing, to test the evidence against him.
His barrister, Dermot Dann, has indicated he may challenge some of the evidence, including his police interview.
He described the admissibility of that interview as “highly questionable” on Monday.
Hunters Damir Jovar and Goran Miljkovic also gave evidence, believing they saw Hill and Clay when they were camped in the area in March 2020.
Through a Serbian translator, the men said they had followed a single-cab white LandCruiser, with a silver toolbox on the back, as they returned to their camp after a day trip.
They saw the vehicle pull into a campsite with some toilets, and park near two other parked vehicles – a white ute and a blue car that was either a Nissan Patrol or station wagon.
Miljkovic also said he heard a gunshot early one morning as they camped, but he said it wasn’t uncommon to hear gunshots at night and he, a deer hunter, believed it was poachers targeting stags.
The hearing is continuing.
