A former airline pilot accused of killing a camper should be released on bail to live with his son ahead of an application for a permanent stay in the case, a Victorian court has heard.

Former Jetstar pilot Gregory Lynn appeared in the Victorian supreme court on Thursday as his lawyers argued that he should be freed from custody for the first time in almost three years.

Lynn, 59, is charged with murdering 73-year-old grandmother Carol Clay in 2020. He was found guilty in 2024 of murdering Clay, but acquitted of murdering her fellow camper and lover Russell Hill, 74.

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The Victorian court of appeal ruled in December that Lynn’s conviction be overturned because a substantial miscarriage of justice occurred in his earlier trial.

It ordered that a new trial should be held in the case.

On Thursday, Justice David Beach said a new trial could be heard as early as July.

Dermot Dann KC, for Lynn, argued that it would be unfair to his client for a trial to be heard any time earlier than 2028, and that he should be released on bail in the meantime.

Lynn’s son Geordie had offered up a surety of more than $400,000 and would allow his father to live with him, Dann said, as well as undertaking to report any breaches of bail conditions to police.

Dann said the prosecution agreed Lynn did not pose an unacceptable risk of reoffending should he be granted bail.

“If we value the concept of a fair trial, and we’re serious about that, how can we possibly subject this man to a trial under these circumstances,” Dann said.

“It cannot be just having him sitting in jail waiting for the damage to unravel somehow with – and only with – the passage of time.”

Beach noted that any application for a stay, either temporary or permanent, would have to be heard by the trial judge in July.

Dann said that left him in somewhat of a catch-22, given the outcome of the stay application would influence the bid for bail.

But he said the interplay between unique circumstances in Lynn’s case meant he should be released from custody, regardless of the impending stay application.

“This is a prosecution case that is beset with difficulties, complications … this collection of circumstance is unique, absolutely unique,” Dann said.

“It is a weak case.”

Mark Gibson SC, for the prosecution, which opposed bail, disputed that the case was weak.

He said that when it was stripped back to the “bare bones”, it was “established fact” that Clay was shot in the head with Lynn’s shotgun, when he was present, and that there was then relevant “extreme” post-offence conduct that made it quite a strong case.

He said Dann had not satisfied the court that exceptional circumstances existed in Lynn’s case, as it must do in order for Lynn to be granted bail.

Dann indicated that Lynn maintains Clay was shot at the campsite by accident.

Beach reserved his decision until 5 March.