EXCLUSIVE
One of the country's longest-serving homicide bosses has defended his former detectives against claims there was “a pattern” of ignoring “credible tips” about the whereabouts of missing baby William Tyrrell.
Former NSW Police Commissioner Mick Willing said extensive resources – and countless hours of work – had been devoted to finding the three-year-old boy since he went missing during a visit to his adoptive grandmother's home in 2014.
Willing said the state's dedicated detectives were heartbroken by their inability to locate the innocent young man in the decade since his disappearance, despite numerous interstate and international sightings.
He rejected any suggestion that investigators had made a public appeal for information about William's fate, only to deliberately dismiss tips phoned into Crime Stoppers or reported to police.
“Strike Force Rosann investigators, under the direction of the lead detective, followed up hundreds of reported sightings of William Tyrrell in the weeks, months and years after his disappearance,” he told Daily Mail Australia.
'While I was Commander of the Homicide Squad, I remember several occasions when alleged sightings of William Tyrrell, both in NSW and other states, occurred in circumstances where the hopes of investigators were raised to the point of excitement.
'But unfortunately, none of the sightings proved to be him.'
His comments came after a new podcast exploring the child's disappearance claimed to have “uncovered troubling allegations suggesting a pattern of information that was not passed on to detectives or was not followed up on by police”.
Missing baby William Tyrrell wore a distinctive Spider-Man costume on the day he disappeared during a visit to his adoptive grandmother's home on the NSW mid-north coast
The three-year-old was last seen playing hide and seek with his sister outside this home
The podcast cited five people who felt reports of sightings of the missing child were not taken seriously by investigators.
One woman claimed she spotted the missing child with a group of people at a campsite near Uluru a year after he disappeared, while another claimed she saw him on a bus journey from Albury to Sydney.
Another potential witness said he was 'annoyed with Crime Stoppers' for not taking him seriously after he reported seeing two cars outside the house where William disappeared, although a lead detective working the case later publicly revealed the clue had been a line of inquiry.
Willing, who commanded the NSW homicide squad between 2011 and 2017, said investigators were inundated with tips following Williams' disappearance.
Although the overwhelming number of tips generated by the public appeal made it impractical to provide personal feedback to each informant, he wanted to assure the public that detectives had worked diligently on all information received.
He said investigators pursued several possible sightings of William in their hunt, only to see their hopes of finding him alive repeatedly dashed.
Former NSW Police Commissioner Mick Willing says police are equally devastated by their inability to locate the missing child after doing everything they could to find her
“The sheer volume of information that a high-profile investigation like the disappearance of William Tyrell obtains, especially if the investigation focuses on using social media as a tool, can be extremely difficult to manage,” he said.
'However, processes were put in place to respond to the alleged sightings of William Tyrell, which included close liaison with police in NSW and investigators in other states in Australia.'
Another potential witness who spoke to the podcast complained that he had called Crime Stoppers to suggest that police investigate a local resident who lived near William's adoptive grandmother, but never heard back.
Willing said the fact that the resident was later publicly identified as a person of interest in William's disappearance — before being ruled out as a suspect — demonstrated how seriously detectives took tips from the community.
He said the manhunt was so widespread that the workload had to be shared across the entire police force.
“In the months following the disappearance, there were literally hundreds of 'persons of interest' who had to be assessed, prioritized and investigated,” he told Daily Mail Australia.
'To do this, follow-up investigations were conducted by the Homicide Squad – the highest priority assessments – other Squads across the State Crime Command and investigators from Local Area Command.'
Investigators initially thought William Tyrrell had been kidnapped by an opportunistic kidnapper, but 10 years later they now believe he is dead.
Willing admitted that police dismissed some of the reports they received, but said this was only done after investigators established they were not “genuine”.
“Among the thousands of genuine phone calls about alleged sightings of William Tyrrell were calls from crackpots, clairvoyants and others who wanted to inject themselves into the public arena,” he said.
The last confirmed sighting of William was at his adoptive grandmother's home in the sleepy town of Kendall, about half an hour's drive southwest of Port Macquarie on the NSW mid-north coast, on September 12, 2014.
He was wearing a distinctive Spider-Man costume and playing hide and seek with his sister outside the house in Benaroon Drive before disappearing at around 10.30am after his adoptive mother went in to make a cup of tea.
She reported him missing on a triple-0 at 10:57 a.m., leading to one of the country's longest-running missing persons investigations.
Although police initially feared William had been kidnapped, he is now presumed dead.
Multiple searches — and a $1 million reward for information — failed to locate his remains.
Police offered a $1 million reward for information leading to little William's whereabouts.
Deputy State Coroner Harriet Grahame conducted an 18-month inquest into the child's disappearance and suspected death before it was adjourned in October 2020 while prosecutors considered charges against the boy's adoptive mother.
Both of William's adoptive parents repeatedly and vigorously denied having any involvement in his disappearance.
The inquest is scheduled to resume next month at the NSW Court of Justice, with final evidence set to be heard in the week before Christmas, before findings are delivered next year.
Willing said that while he shared the public's frustration that police had yet to solve the long-standing mystery, he insisted that the detectives involved were doing everything they could to bring those responsible for William's disappearance to justice.
“Ultimately we all want to know what happened to William and we hope the inquest provides some answers,” he said.
