Chris Dawson’s daughter Shanelle shares cryptic post after he was convicted of murdering Lyn Dawson

Chris Dawson’s daughter has shared a poem about ‘enduring and suffering’ in a cryptic post made just hours after her dad was locked up likely for the rest of his life.

Dawson, 74, was found guilty of murdering his first wife Lynette Dawson on Tuesday and was sent to Silverwater Jail in Sydney to await sentencing.

The couple’s daughter, Shanelle Dawson, who was just four-years-old when her mother Lyn vanished, has not been in court for her father’s trial but appeared to address the case on Wednesday morning.

She shared a short excerpt from the poem Still Possible, written by David Whyte, which describes understanding that ‘you have secretly been, all along, a goodness that can continue to be a goodness to itself’.

‘It’s still possible in the end to realise why you are here and why you have endured, and why you might have suffered so much,’ the poem continues.

‘So that in the end, you could witness love, miraculously arriving from nowhere, crossing bravely as it does, out of darkness, from that great and spacious stillness inside you.’

Shanelle was just four-years-old when her mother Lyn (pictured with Chris Dawson) vanished. Her father was convicted of her murder on Tuesday

Her post was inundated with supportive comments from loved ones, many saying they were thinking of her.

Ms Dawson, a mother herself, said the poem ‘inspired those of us when we forget to do so’.

She was absent from the NSW Supreme Court on Tuesday where Justice Ian Harrison found her father guilty of her mother’s murder.

Dawson’s lawyer Greg Walsh on Thursday said the one-time teacher and football star had already received serious death threats from several inmates in Silverwater jail in the short time he’d been there.

Chris Dawson in his suit on Tuesday before he was convicted of the 1982 murder of Lynette Dawson and taken away to prison

Mr Walsh also said that Dawson was ‘in shock and sad about his predicament, and worried about his children’.

Mr Walsh did not make an application for bail on Thursday morning when Dawson appeared before the same court he’d been convicted in, clad in his prison greens.

Mr Walsh asked Justice Ian Harrison for a recommendation that Dawson get care from mental health services, but His Honour said he didn’t have the power to tell Corrective Services what to do.   

Following his client’s conviction, Mr Walsh said that Dawson maintained his innocence and would be appealing the guilty verdict. 

He will be sentenced on November 11.

Shanelle is seen with her mother Lyn before her disappearance in 1982

In a dramatic day on Tuesday, Justice Harrison found Dawson guilty just after 3pm – 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 schoolgirl babysitter JC, with 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.

There were gasps in the courtroom the moment the verdict was handed down – following some 4.5 hours of the judge reading out his reasons – with Dawson shaking his head very slightly and his twin brother Paul muttering ‘bulls***’.

Two prison officers entered the room and handcuffed him. Dawson appeared to limp as he was led away, arms stretched awkwardly in front of him, to be taken into custody. 

He spent the night in the cells at Sydney’s Surry Hills police centre before being taken to Silverwater prison in western Sydney on Wednesday. 

In a teary interview with 60 Minutes back in 2018, Shanelle Dawson said ‘it’s not looking good for my father, I will be honest to say’.

She also told The Teacher’s Pet podcast – which 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,’ Ms Dawson said. 

Shanelle is seen with her mother Lyn and father Chris Dawson. Shanelle said her mother was rarely spoken about after her disappearance