A judge has broken down in tears as he sentenced airline pilot Greg Lynn to decades in jail for the “brutal and horrific” killing of missing camper Carol Clay.

Justice Michael Croucher handed down the sentence in the Victorian Supreme Court on Friday as Clay’s family and friends watched on.

Lynn, 58, blinked and stared straight ahead as he learnt of his 32-year jail term. He will be eligible for parole after 24 years, when he is well into his 70s.

A jury in June found Lynn guilty of shooting Clay in the head at a Victorian high country campsite in March 2020.

He then placed her body – and the body of her lover Russell Hill – into a trailer and then drove them to a remote bush track.

Lynn returned seven months later after the Covid-19 lockdown lifted to burn their remains into more than 2000 bone fragments.

The former Jetstar pilot maintained his innocence, claiming the deaths of both Clay and Hill were accidental.

After a month-long trial, the jury found him guilty of murdering Clay but acquitted him over Hill’s death.

Lynn continues to deny the murder but conceded he destroyed the couple’s remains and much of the campsite’s evidence.

Police found Hill and Clay’s campsite burnt out.

Croucher described the killing as “violent, brutal and horrific” in sentencing Lynn on Friday. Burning the remains was an aggravating feature and showed Lynn’s moral culpability was high, he said.

“This was just a terrible thing to do, hence my conclusion this is a very grave murder,” he said.

Croucher noted the “profoundly moving” statements from Clay’s loved ones, who remembered her as a loving grandmother.

The judge also became emotional as he acknowledged Hill’s family, including his wife Robyn, who was in the courtroom.

While they were not considered victims in the eyes of the law due to acquittal, Croucher said it was clear they were also in pain.

“As one person to another, as a matter of common human decency, I should acknowledge their plight, their agony, their suffering – and I do,” he said.

He also took into account that Lynn led police to the remains and apologised for his “despicable” actions after the murder.

Croucher said that “tempered” the aggravating post-offence conduct, although only modestly.

Lynn’s prospects of rehabilitation were also reasonable and the sentence should not be crushing, Croucher said. But it should justly reflect the seriousness of the crime and deter others from committing murder, he said.

Leaving court, Lynn’s barrister Dermot Dann KC confirmed his client’s plan to appeal.

Dann told the court in July the conviction would be appealed, claiming the prosecution had conducted the trial unfairly and there was inconsistency in the jury’s two verdicts.

“There’s nothing to say today, we’ll just wait for the Court of Appeal,” he said on Friday.

“We have 28 days to lodge the appeal and we’re instructed to lodge that appeal against conviction, so we’ll just have to see how that goes.”

The case’s lead investigator Brett Florence gave a thumbs-up, while the Hill and Clay families chose not to comment.

-AAP