{"id":72149,"date":"2025-10-11T14:56:12","date_gmt":"2025-10-11T14:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/72149\/"},"modified":"2025-10-11T14:56:12","modified_gmt":"2025-10-11T14:56:12","slug":"criminologist-says-third-party-likely-in-disappearance-of-gus-lamont","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/72149\/","title":{"rendered":"Criminologist says \u2018third party\u2019 likely in disappearance of Gus Lamont"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe scale of the search and how detailed it was, and the drones and everything else, it does feel at this stage, sadly, that if they haven\u2019t found something that it\u2019s likely to be third-party involvement.\u201d<\/p>\n

Little was found in the 10-day search except for a \u201csmall boot print\u201d near a dam.<\/p>\n

However, the footprint was later ruled out with police saying it was not related to the search.<\/p>\n

Mallett said given the \u201cremote\u201d nature of the area near Oak Park Station, the lack of evidence found in the search also points to a third party.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen they were looking for [alleged police killer] Dezi Freeman<\/a>, that was a really hard environment to search by plane or drone because it\u2019s such dense bushland, whereas this isn\u2019t that kind of scenario,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf he were wandering or had fallen, then the technology and the search strategies they\u2019ve applied should have located him.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fact they\u2019ve scaled back means that they feel that they have searched well enough to do that. So, it does feel sadly like that there\u2019s probably somebody else involved.\u201d<\/p>\n

Next stage of investigation<\/p>\n

Police believe Gus was living at the remote homestead with his mother Jess, his 1-year-old brother Ronnie and his grandparents.<\/p>\n

\"PolicePolice are expected to be shifting their focus to a possible third party in the case of missing boy Gus Lamont. Photo \/ NewsWire\/Dean Martin<\/p>\n

It is believed Gus\u2019 father Joshua lives in Blalie North near Jamestown, about 100km west of the homestead.<\/p>\n

None of Gus\u2019 family members is accused of any wrongdoing or involvement in his disappearance.<\/p>\n

Speaking generally about missing children\u2019s cases, Mallett said police are likely to start looking into those \u201cphysically present\u201d at the time of Gus\u2019 disappearance.<\/p>\n

\u201cEspecially with young children, they will look at those family dynamics,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Phone tower pings<\/p>\n

Mallett also said one major component of the case, which will assist police, is the lack of phone towers in the remote area.<\/p>\n

In the case of Cleo Smith, who was taken from a campsite in Western Australia, a single ping to a phone tower, which was only built in 2018, helped lead police to the phone of her kidnapper, Terence Darrell Kelly.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere won\u2019t [have been] that many people in that area,\u201d Mallett said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo those people whose phones do ping, [police will] be able to track down and speak to.\u201d<\/p>\n

William Tyrrell lead detective weighs in<\/p>\n

Former homicide squad detective Gary Jubelin is also of the opinion that another person is involved in the Gus Lamont case.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe investigation is now being managed by the missing persons section, with ongoing lines of inquiry. Photo \/ Supplied \/ SA Police<\/p>\n

Jubelin said the fact police were looking at third-person intervention was a lesson learnt from the William Tyrrell investigation<\/a>, in which he said the \u201cwhole focus was on finding the little boy lost\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cChildren disappearing at that age is a rare event,\u201d he told Nine\u2019s Today show on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat police would be looking for is, has the disappearance been the result of wandering off, misadventure and getting lost, or is there some form of intervention involved in his disappearance?<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I\u2019m seeing now and what I\u2019m reading between the lines of what South Australian Police [are doing], they\u2019re looking at other possibilities that there was perhaps intervention. So it\u2019s difficult for the families involved and even for the police.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Deputy Commissioner Linda Williams revealed the case had been moved to the missing persons section.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe investigation is now being managed by missing persons section, which is part of Major Crime Investigation Branch, and that\u2019s where all long-term cases such as this are managed and investigated,\u201d Williams said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will never give up hope of finding Gus.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are further lines of inquiry being undertaken and the family have continued to co-operate fully with police.\u201d<\/p>\n

Police earlier deployed a special drone in the search, with Williams confirming the \u201csignificant aerial search\u201d involved a special drone with infra-red capabilities.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe results of that drone analysis are still being analysed. We hope to have those results in the coming weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a statement, SA Police said they were continuing to look at \u201call options\u201d.<\/p>\n

Sign up to Herald Premium Editor\u2019s Picks<\/a>, delivered straight to your inbox every Friday. Editor-in-Chief Murray Kirkness picks the week\u2019s best features, interviews and investigations. Sign up for Herald Premium here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThe scale of the search and how detailed it was, and the drones and everything else, it does…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":72150,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[47179,74,85,1863,1970,21137,57025,9770,5658,679,57026,42,78,2205,57027,120,6501,43,1118,4762,675,13913,312,1109,1870,1240,3755,1961,40,38,41,39,686,3608,102],"class_list":["post-72149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-4yearold","tag-after","tag-australia","tag-back","tag-believe","tag-criminal","tag-criminologist","tag-disappearance","tag-experts","tag-forced","tag-gus","tag-headlines","tag-in","tag-involved","tag-lamont","tag-likely","tag-missing","tag-news","tag-of","tag-party","tag-police","tag-remote","tag-says","tag-scale","tag-search","tag-south","tag-third","tag-this","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-week","tag-were","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72149\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}