The temporary fence, which hides the site of the fire that killed Jeffrey Lindsell. Credit:Kate Geraghty “It’s imprinted, imprinted up here,” Mr Lindsell says, wincing at the memory of his 39-year-old son Jeffrey bursting from the flat, flames engulfing his body. If the memory wasn’t painful enough, the Lindsells are now grappling with the knowledge the fire was no accident, while police work doggedly to uncover who may have targeted their son and why. "I’ve felt sick ever since I was told it may have been deliberately lit,” Mrs Lindsell says. “As far as we knew, Jeffrey didn’t have any enemies or anyone that might harm him. But someone knows, and we need that someone to help him.”

"Someone knows:" Des and Kathy Lindsell at their home in Gymea, where their son Jeffrey was killed in a fire. Credit:Kate Geraghty The fire It was a Saturday morning, around 1.30, when the knocking and screams of neighbours woke Mr and Mrs Lindsell and plunged them into their worst nightmare. A vicious fire had engulfed the two-bedroom flat at the back of their Gymea home, where their son Jeffrey had lived for the past 10 years. By the time Mr Lindsell ran out through the main house, there was little he could do to stop the blaze.

Seeing Jeffrey’s car missing from the driveway, he took it for granted that his firstborn son was not home. The fiery blaze that destroyed the Gymea unit and killed Jeffrey Lindsell. But within seconds, Jeffrey, who had left his car at the pub, launched himself through the screen door, his body covered in flames. “I don’t even have to close my eyes to see him running out of the house,” says Mrs Lindsell. “I used to like watching flames. I used to think it was relaxing. Not any more.”

In what would be his last words, Jeffrey managed to scream that he had been “asleep” and didn’t know what happened, while Mr Lindsell tried in vain to extinguish the flames. On instinct, he had reached for the garden hose, but nothing more than a dribble of water emerged. When an investigation began in the days following, the Lindsell family would learn why. The investigation Just over 45 minutes south of Sydney’s CBD, sleepy Gymea is a quintessential postcard of Australian suburbia.

Long concrete driveways lead to red brick and weatherboard houses, along streets dotted with the occasional gum or banksia bush. From the Gymea hotel, it is a short, 400-metre walk to the flat behind the Lindsell family’s weatherboard home, where Jeffrey and his siblings, Nathan and Corinne, grew up. On the night of his death the 39-year-old made the short journey home, just like any other Friday evening; he could always pick up his car the next day. The walk takes a mere five minutes, but for investigators it is a precious window of time that could hold vital information about the night Jeffrey died. Jeffrey Lindsell, pictured in CCTV footage as he left the Gymea Hotel on October 7, 2017. Credit:NSW Police

Last year detectives from the State Crime Command’s Arson Unit established Strike Force Butler to investigate the circumstances that led to the fire in the early hours of Saturday, October 7. To date they have established Jeffrey was at the pub with friends on the Friday evening, before leaving alone around midnight. What came next remains unknown. Investigators have now released CCTV of Jeffrey walking between the pub and his home, in hope a member of the community may recall seeing him or anyone else in the area that night. “In the CCTV, we see Mr Lindsell pass a service station about midnight, and detectives are still trying to piece together exactly what happened between that time and the arrival of emergency services at his home 90 minutes later,” says Detective Superintendent Linda Howlett, Commander of the Financial Crimes Squad, which includes the Arson Unit.

“We have reviewed hours of CCTV, and while it doesn’t appear Mr Lindsell was followed home, we believe someone was with him [in the flat] and knows how the fire started,” she said. “In particular, we are keen to speak with motorists who may have been driving along Gymea Bay Road or The Kingsway around that time and noticed something suspicious.” One of the last photos of Jeffrey, taken a few months before his death. Like a movie, Mr Lindsell can replay the night of the fire in his mind; from the moment he woke to the screams of neighbours, to the seconds it took him to run out the back door and reach for the garden hose. "I started hosing, but nothing happened,” he recalls. “There was no water pressure.”

Mr Lindsell now knows that two taps were left running full blast inside the flat at the time of the fire. The gushing taps were among the first things noticed by fire investigators when they entered the flat, leaving little doubt that someone else had been in the flat, while Jeffrey slept. Investigators since have confirmed the fire was not the result of an electrical fault, and was most likely deliberately lit. But the exact cause remains unknown, with any evidence of accelerants destroyed by the severity of the blaze.

Jeffrey Lindsell.

For the Lindsells, the biggest frustration is not knowing what came in the hours before. Since October, friends have offered mixed explanations of the Friday night at the pub. Some say there was nothing unusual, while others remember Jeffrey upset by something, or that an argument had possibly taken place. “We don’t know what happened with Jeff at the pub, or on the way home,” Mrs Lindsell says. “We’re just hoping that someone knows, or at least remembers something that might help give us some answers.”

The family

Where Des and Kathy Lindsell once took solace in an open fireplace, they now recoil. Birthday candles are a thing of the past and the television remote is always at the ready, to flick away from anything on screen “about fire''. "The thing that really triggers me is smoke,” says Mrs Lindsell, remembering her reaction to the smell of a barbecue late last year.



“I started to walk towards it and I could smell smoke. I just stopped and thought I can’t go any further, and I had to walk back to the car.” Jeff Lindsell's four-year-old hand print in the driveway of his family home in Gymea, Sydney. Credit:Kate Geraghty For Mr Lindsell, simply the scent of roasted nuts is too visceral to bear.



“I get a whiff of it and … I feel like … just getting out of the place,” he says. “It’s hurt me." In their living room a framed hi-vis polo shirt now hangs in tribute to “Jeffro'', a gift from colleagues at retailer Harvey Norman, where he worked as a warehouse manager. A few of Jeff's favourite things in the family lounge room. Credit:Kate Geraghty Close by, Jeffrey’s beloved fishing rods and cricket bat lean against a wall in memory of the outdoor lifestyle he loved, while songs from his favourite band, The Foo Fighters, are often heard floating through the house. It may be a little further than the flat out the back, but almost five months on, the Lindsells have found joy in Jeffrey’s new resting place.

“He’s in a very lovely spot at Woronora [Memorial Park],” says Mr Lindsell. “Under the gum trees, looking over at the cricket field. I often ask him who won a day’s game of cricket.” To anyone with information about the night of Jeffrey’s death, Mrs Lindsell says she only asks that they come forward and tell police what they know, “so that Jeffrey can be at peace''. “Jeff was such a kind and thoughtful person, always ready to help anyone who needed it,” she says. “Now he needs someone to help him.” Do you know more? Email lucy.cormack@fairfaxmedia.com.au

Contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.