Ex-cop Gary Jubelin has admitted he is still obsessed with the disappearance of toddler William Tyrrell a decade after the child went missing and he was taken off the case.

Jubelin, a former homicide investigator who was removed as boss of the Tyrrell task force after illegally recording a then-suspect, spoke out on Stellar magazine’s podcast, Something To Talk About.

His comments come after an inquest examined the three-year-old’s disappearance from his foster grandmother’s home at Kendall on the NSW mid north coast in September 2014.

No trace of him was found during wide-ranging searches and a NSW Supreme Court judge has since ruled he was most likely dead.

Now Jubelin confessed that he cannot let the case go, despite his removal from the official investigation.

‘I am still passionate about the William Tyrrell matter. I can’t let it go,’ he said.

‘There was criticism of things I did. I still stand by what I did. The courts have criticised me.

‘I’ve got to accept the findings of the court. But I also believe the courts are only as good as the information that’s been provided to them.’

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Ex-cop Gary Jubelin admits he’s still obsessed with William Tyrrell’s disappearance a decade after the toddler vanished and launched a broadside at the current investigation

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Jubelin said he believed people have a right to be critical of the investigation into William’s 2014 disappearance which has found no trace of the missing toddler

Jubelin was appointed commander of Strike Force Rosann, then removed as lead detective on the case and quit the force in 2019 after being accused of secretly taping one of the neighbours of Tyrrell’s foster grandma.

Jubelin was prosecuted and convicted and lost his subsequent appeal against that conviction.

More than a decade later, Tyrrell remains Australia’s most high-profile missing person.

Deputy state coroner Harriet Grahame suddenly closed the inquest into the mystery in December last year, with the finding to be published at a later date.

But many fear it will find nothing much more than what was established during the hearings: that the boy did not leave the Kendall house under his own steam.

Despite police submitting to the coroner that they believed that William’s foster mother was involved in the three-year-old’s disappearance and disposed of his body – which she denies – no one has been charged.

Jubelin called out the unconfirmed police theory about the foster mum n in the podcast.

‘I led that investigation for four years, documented all the decisions I made and the directions I headed in,’ he said.

‘And I am quite confused by the way it has played out publicly and how the foster mother has been named as a person of interest.

‘When I took the investigation over five months after William’s disappearance, in the handover from Detective Hans Rupp, who was running the investigation to start with, he told me in the handover that the family had been eliminated.

‘When I was running the investigation, I had another look at the family, and there was a strike force to explore some aspects of it, very vigorously had a look at the family again, overt and covert investigative techniques.

‘I came away from that very confident that the foster mother and foster father had no involvement in William’s disappearance.

‘The foster mother gave evidence in support of me at my hearing and was also critical of senior police.

‘Then she becomes a person of interest after she criticised senior police, and that’s been leaked to the media.

‘Something about this does not feel right.

‘I can’t let it go, I won’t let it go, and it’s not me losing perspective, and it’s not me trying to justify my position. I think we – and I’m still including myself as a police officer in this term – should be judged on the way that investigation was handled.

‘I don’t know how the public could possibly have confidence in what’s going on.

‘There was a coronial inquest, and we’ve heard the commissioner for police say there’s only one suspect, pointing the finger at the foster mother, and there is no evidence to support that.

‘You can’t make allegations like that.’

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Police search the house from which William vanished in 2014, but this renewed probe in 2021 yielded no clues as to where the toddler’s remains might be

Jubelin said he believed the public has a right to be critical of the investigation.

‘I still think it’s disgraceful the way it is playing out at the moment,’ he added.

‘I am as confused as the public on the information that has got out. Not just blaming the police, media have reported on things. Everyone’s got an opinion.

‘In terms of closure, I think there really needs to be some line of inquiry over what’s happened with that investigation.

‘I’m not seeing things come out at the inquest that I thought were relevant.

‘A young child has disappeared, and that shouldn’t get lost in all the politics and infighting. We all should be working in the same direction to bring some closure.

‘Therein lies my frustration about not being able to do a handover.

‘How can you take someone off an investigation they’ve been working on for four years without a handover?

‘And it wasn’t me spitting the dummy saying no, I’m not going to speak to you because you’ve been horrible to me. I’m saying I will help in any way I can.

‘I turned up at the inquest in my suit, ready to give evidence.

‘I haven’t been called as a witness. I ran the investigation for four years.

‘And Dave Laidlaw, who’s run the investigation for six years, hasn’t been called as a witness.

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This image created by US-based Parabon Nano Labs shows what William Tyrrell might look at age 13, 10 years after he disappeared without a trace

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Despite millions of dollars and thousands of house of police investigation William has not been seen since he disappeared from his foster grandmother’s home in Kendall, on the NSW mid-north coast, on September 12, 2014

‘I have not seen anything like it.

‘In saying this, if there is an inquiry, if I have not done something right or whatever, I’m happy for the criticism because we’ve got to improve. We’ve got to be judged by that.

‘It’s sad all around, and it breaks my heart.

‘The people who have pointed the finger at the foster mother, if they are found out that’s not correct, I don’t know how they can sleep with themselves because they have destroyed the person’s life.’

On his removal from the Tyrrell investigation, Jubelin said ‘that hurt me more than losing my career’.

‘I’d made the commitment to William Tyrrell’s family, foster and biological, I’d do whatever was humanly possible.’

On his departure from the force after 34 years as a cop, he said: ‘Take my gun, take my badge, take my power, take everything away from me and look, I’m still standing, I’m still surviving.’

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14294629/Top-cop-drops-William-Tyrrell-bombshell-10-years-vanished-without-trace-does-not-feel-right.html