The daughter of convicted ‘Teacher’s Pet’ killer Chris Dawson has revealed the heartbreaking question her own daughter asked her about her grandfather.
Shanelle Dawson grew up without knowing her mother Lynette – who was murdered in 1982 at her home in Sydney‘s Northern Beaches by her former professional rugby league-playing father amid an affair he was having with a 16-year-old student.
She now has her own young daughter named Kialah.
‘My daughter did say to me one day, can she go and visit her grandfather in jail,’ Shanelle revealed to The Weekend Australian in an interview published Saturday.
Shanelle said she had never considered visiting her father, who is serving a 24-year sentence for Lynette’s murder plus another three years for unlawful carnal knowledge of his 16-year-old student, whom he later married.
‘I certainly do feel like I might want or need to at some point before he dies, but I’m also really well aware of the fact he might not even want to see me,’ she said.
Chris and Lynette Dawson’s daughter Shanelle (pictured) revealed the heartbreaking question her own daughter Kialah asked her
Dawson in his suit in September 2022 before he was convicted of the 1982 murder of Lynette and taken away to prison
Shanelle said she assumed her father might feel betrayed by her after she delivered a powerful and furious victim impact statement in court describing being robbed of her mother by his ‘selfish, brutal and misogynistic act’.
‘He very likely probably doesn’t want to see me because on some level he might even blame me for the fact that he’s incarcerated.’
In September 2022, Justice Ian Harrison found Dawson guilty, bringing to a close a mystery that has haunted Lynette’s family and Sydney’s northern beaches for four decades.
His Honour said Dawson was motivated by his obsessive infatuation with the schoolgirl babysitter, known as JC.
His motivation was the fear of losing her and clearing the impediment that his wife Lyn represented, as well as not losing hold of his assets as would happen in a divorce, Justice Harrison said.
Shanelle said 10 months on she is now focused on healing after decades of doubt and questions about why her mother abandoned her, as she was ‘gas-lighted’ into believing.
Dawson told Shanelle, then four, and her two-year-old younger sister that their mother had simply walked out because she didn’t love them anymore.
Shanelle is seen with her mother Lyn before her disappearance in 1982
Shanelle was just four-years-old when her mother Lyn vanished (pictured with Chris Dawson)
Shanelle told The Teacher’s Pet podcast – which has had 80million downloads and brought Lyn’s disappearance back into the spotlight – that her mother was rarely spoken about after she went missing.
‘We didn’t mention my mother. There was, I don’t really know why, but just this really uncomfortable silence,’ Shanelle said.
Dawson has never revealed details about what really happened and Lynette’s body was never found.
Shanelle said she thinks he never will but that she also believes someone else does know and holds out hope they will eventually speak up to ‘lighten their conscience’.
Lynette would have been 75 years old on September 25.
Shanelle said she and Kialah celebrated for her by playing some songs which they dedicated to their mother and grandmother.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Dailymail.co.uk
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