William Tyrrell's foster father has been found not guilty of knowingly giving false evidence to the crime commission during a hearing about the boy's disappearance. A Sydney magistrate was not convinced he deliberately lied when he denied knowledge that his wife had assaulted a different child in their care.
00:00 As he walked from court, William Tyrrell's foster father decided to let the verdict speak for itself.
00:08 Minutes earlier, he was cleared of lying to the state's crime commission during a hearing in 2021,
00:15 where he and his wife were questioned over William's disappearance from Kendall on the state's mid-north coast in 2014.
00:22 The foster mother was also found not guilty last year of lying to the commission.
00:27 Prosecutors this week played covert recordings to the court.
00:31 In them, the couple could be heard discussing incidents where the foster mother had hit and kicked another child in their care prior to the crime commission hearing.
00:40 They argued this proved he had lied when he denied any knowledge of her assaulting the child.
00:46 But the magistrate sided with the defence, dismissing all five charges levelled against him by the team investigating his foster son's disappearance.
00:55 In delivering his verdict, Magistrate John Arms told the court in three of the counts,
01:00 the questions asked of the foster father were too ambiguous, while in the other two counts, he was not convinced he had intentionally lied.
01:08 In a statement, the foster father's lawyer said he always maintained his innocence in relation to these charges and is glad the court found that way.
01:16 His concern remains, as it always has, that William Tyrrell remains a missing person.
01:21 The inquest into the little boy's disappearance will likely resume early next year.
