Witness tells how he helped in alleged cold case murder

A man who assisted in the alleged murder of a Warrnambool man more than two decades ago has told a jury he was told to keep quiet about the crime, otherwise he would be killed next.

Warning: This article includes violent descriptions of an alleged murder that some readers may find distressing.

Steven Frederick Johnson, 74, has pleaded not guilty to one charge of murder in relation to the disappearance of 38-year-old Christopher Jarvis on June 13, 2006, from his Wangoom home near Warrnambool.

Mr Jarvis's burnt-out car was found at the regional city's popular coastal lookout, Thunder Point, later that day.

His body has never been found.

It is the Crown's case that Mr Johnson orchestrated a violent attack on his tenant, Mr Jarvis, over $2,210 in rent arrears, before disposing of his body and setting his car alight.

The court has heard the two men were engaged in a civil dispute, with a VCAT hearing scheduled for the day after Mr Jarvis disappeared.

The defence argues that Mr Johnson was seeking to resolve the rental dispute by lawful means and he had no involvement in Mr Jarvis's disappearance.

In the Supreme Court sitting at Warrnambool today, a man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, gave evidence about how Mr Johnson would refer to his neighbour, Mr Jarvis, as the "prick next door [that's] got to go", and that his tenant owed him money for rent and a car.

The court heard the man agreed to help Mr Johnson get Mr Jarvis out of the rental property.

"I assumed Steve was going to go out there and rough him up … to scare him into paying," he told the court.

The court heard the men met up near Mr Jarvis's home early in the morning and approached him from behind as he closed a gate, while his Ford station wagon idled in the driveway.

The man told the court he watched the accused hit Mr Jarvis over the head with a pistol before he grabbed the man by the shoulder and threw him to the ground.

"I seen [sic] fear in Mr Jarvis's eyes,"

he said.

Shallow grave

The unnamed man said Mr Jarvis called out for help, and Mr Johnson then put his hand over Mr Jarvis's mouth.

"He was thrashing around on the ground," the man told the court.

The man said he held Mr Jarvis's legs to the ground, and Mr Johnson fired an empty pistol near his ear, causing blood to flow from his head.

The court heard that the two men put the injured man in the back of his own car, before Mr Johnson drove out to Framlingham Forest.

The court heard the men dug a shallow grave in the bushland.

The unnamed man said Mr Johnson stripped Mr Jarvis naked, putting his bloody clothes back into the car before he used a baseball bat already in the vehicle to strike Mr Jarvis on the head with force, killing him.

"Mr Jarvis was making slight groaning noises, then everything went dead quiet," the man told the court.

The court heard Mr Jarvis's body was then pushed into the grave.

The court heard the men then drove separately to Thunder Point, with Mr Johnson driving Mr Jarvis's car and the unnamed man driving his own black Holden Commodore ute.

The unnamed man said Mr Johnson drove Mr Jarvis's vehicle into the sand dunes, doused it with petrol and set it alight.

The court heard Mr Johnson got in the black ute's passenger seat, with the unnamed man behind the wheel.

"He looked me in the eye … and said to me, 'You say anything about this and you're f*****g next,'" the man told the court.

"I took that as a death threat."

The court heard the unnamed man then drove away from Thunder Point at great speed, dropping Mr Johnson off at his Wangoom home, before returning to his own home.

Accused was 'greedy', court hears

Yesterday, the unnamed man told the jury that he met Mr Johnson around 1992 through the accused's business running a rubbish tip.

Crown prosecutor Mark Gibson KC asked the man about what he observed about how Mr Johnson was with money.

"You want me to be truthful?" the man asked.

Mr Gibson replied he did.

"He was a greedy c**t," the man told the court.

Earlier, the court heard Mr Jarvis's 36-year-old daughter Bree Jarvis had not had contact with her father since he disappeared shortly before her 16th birthday.

The court also heard from Mr Jarvis's nephew, Simon McLaren, who told the jury that he went alone to Thunder Point the day after his uncle went missing.

"[I found] his car burnt out … surrounded by shrub, no police tape or barriers or cordon," he told the court.

The court heard Mr McLaren took his uncle's baseball bat, bandana and mobile phone from the car, before handing them to police about a year later.

Retired Warrnambool teacher Michael Kibblewhite also gave evidence about how he saw a large cloud of smoke at Thunder Point on the morning of the alleged crime, and a black ute travelling at speed away from the lookout.