NSW Police have been ordered to pay a former suspect in the William Tyrrell investigation almost $1.5 million in damages.
Washing machine repairman William "Bill" Spedding has successfully sued the police for malicious prosecution after historic child sex allegations were unproven.
Today a Supreme Court judge awarded him $1,484,292 in damages and ordered NSW Police also pay his legal costs.
Mr Spedding, 70, was publicly outed as a suspect in the disappearance of William Tyrrell back in 2015 when police searched his home.
Mr Spedding had visited William's foster grandmother's house on the NSW north coast to fix her washing machine in the days before he vanished.
A call to Crime Stoppers then led to the same detectives charging him with historical child sex offences dating back to 1987, unrelated to the William Tyrrell case.
He was one of the first persons of interest publicly named in the feverish media coverage surrounding how William had vanished.
Then, in 2018, Mr Spedding was cleared of the allegations at a trial, which heard the allegations had been falsified during an old legal battle.
Police also later cleared him of any involvement in William Tyrrell's disappearance.
"No amount of money will restore the life I enjoyed before this terrible nightmare," he said outside court today.
"I was prosecuted for crimes I did not commit, all in the hope that my prosecution would further the police investigation of me as a suspect in the disappearance of William Tyrrell."
Mr Spedding said he hoped authorities would learn from this decision.
"This type of conduct engaged in by the prosecuting authorities must be deterred," he said.
He also said he hoped William's case could still be solved.
Mr Spedding previously detailed how being identified as a suspect in the William Tyrrell investigation had taken its toll, saying he lost 20 kilograms and avoids being out in public.
In his reasons, Judge Ian Harrison found NSW Police had subjected Mr Spedding to a "harsh and cynical strategy to further an unrelated investigation".
He said the historical sexual assault allegations were old and discredited and prosecution should never have occurred.
"Mr Spedding's reputation was comprehensively destroyed as the result of his arrest and prosecution on the historical sexual assault allegations. It is doubtful that it will ever be restored," the judgement said.
Judge Harrison said neither the officers involved, nor NSW Police prosecutors had apologised.
