The final hearing sessions of the inquest into disappearance of three-year-old William Tyrrell has been unexpectedly cancelled at the last moment.

The last week of evidence hearings was due to resume on Monday but will now no longer go ahead.

‘I can confirm that the Coroner has closed the evidence in the Tyrrell inquest and vacated the hearing dates from 16-20 December, 2024,’ a spokesman confirmed on Tuesday.

It has not been revealed when Deputy State Coroner Harriet Grahame will deliver her findings.

William Tyrrell was last seen at the home of his foster grandmother in Kendall on September 12, 2014, before he vanished without trace.

The mystery of the toddler’s disappearance has run cold for more than a decade with Lidcombe Coroner’s Court in November hearing NSW Police’s Strike Force Rosann had not uncovered any forensic or eyewitness evidence.

Several theories have been floated during the inquest, including allegations that William’s foster mother hid his body after he ‘died from a fall’ out of fear she would lose access to another child in her care.

The foster mother, who cannot be identified, has repeatedly denied any involvement in William’s disappearance.  

William Tyrrell (pictured) was last seen at the home of his foster grandmother in Kendall on September 12, 2014

The abrupt shutdown by Coroner Grahame comes after she refused to allow the Tyrrell task force commander’s request to testify, and denied the police request to re-examine William’s foster mother. 

The coroner levelled criticism at Strike Force Rosann’s boss Detective Chief Inspector David Laidlaw’s submission when the inquest briefly resumed in early November, saying it contained matters of opinion rather than fact. 

The document was tabled in a heavily redacted form. 

Ms Grahame was also reluctant to allow any further evidence to be heard in the now-cancelled week of hearings before Christmas.

These included the testimony of a scientific expert on the removal of remains from the bush by predators such as wild dogs or foxes.

A video of the missing toddler’s foster mother being grilled in 2021 by the NSW Crime Commission after she was identified as a person of interest was played at what is now the long-running inquest’s final hearings last month.

In the NSWCC interview, the foster mother was warned she risked jail time if she lied. 

The 59-year-old answered ‘I don’t know’ more than 70 times in over two hours of questioning. 

Several theories have been floated during the inquest, including that William’s (pictured) foster mother hid his body after he ‘died from a fall’ 

Sophie Callan, counsel assisting the Crime Commission, questioned the foster mother about why she hadn’t immediately dialled Triple-0 or called the foster father when she realised William was gone.

Callan also asked why the foster mother took her mother’s Mazda down the road immediately after the three-year-old’s disappearance. The foster mother said looking for William by car was ‘quicker’.

Asked why there was nearly 20 minutes between noticing Tyrrell had vanished and calling emergency services, she replied: ‘I don’t know.

‘It’s a panic … all I could think was, I don’t know, I panicked. Where is he? I don’t know where he is.

‘I don’t know what I was thinking. All I could think about was I have to find him. I can’t give you an answer to that.

‘I remember driving, I remember stopping, I remember thinking I can’t see him, this is silly, so I went back.’

Callan played a telephone conversation between the foster mother and a friend recorded via a legal phone tap in 2021.

During the call, the woman said that William’s body would be found by ‘clearing’ local bushland.

‘He’ll be found in 30 or 40 or 50 or 200 years’ time when they are doing a clearing and they find the skeleton,’ she said in the call played at the inquest.

‘I don’t believe that if I had done anything to William that I would have tried to cover it up, I would own up to it. I just can’t see it in me.’

The foster mother (pictured left), who cannot be identified, has repeatedly denied any involvement in William’s disappearance

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In the Crime Commission interview, the foster mother wept and denied that the phone conversation revealed she knew where William was buried. ‘No, no, no,’ she said.

A timetable for written submissions to the inquest has been set down. 

Ms Grahame will deliver findings next year, but few have confidence that she will be able to say anything more than that William did not leave his grandmother’s house on his own, and that he was taken – dead or alive – from the scene. 

It will be five years in March 2025 since the inquest began, which has been beset by delays as well as the arrest and conviction of the Tyrrell task force’s former boss Gary Jubelin over his conduct during the investigation into the disappearance.