Police may have to rethink the timeline of William Tyrrell's disappearance after CCTV photos of a local man leaving the Kendall tennis club suggest the boy may have gone missing up to an hour earlier than originally thought.
Time stamps on the photos show Richard Donoghue - who lived 270m from William's foster grandmother - left the tennis club after overhearing a call to a local policewoman at the club.
Mr Donoghue later told police the call, which came in just before he left the club at 9.43am on Friday, September 12, 2014, made him 'think there was a child missing'.
'I cannot recall if she said where the child was missing from,' he said in one of three interviews with police after William Tyrrell vanished.
The call to policewoman Wendy Hudson and Mr Donoghue's departure from the club, which was caught on CCTV, happened around 45 minutes before William's foster mother states William disappeared.
And it was also more than an hour before the foster mother made the Triple-0 call to report that the three-year-old had vanished.
Child advocate Allanna Smith told Daily Mail Australia that the timeline of William's last morning needed re-investigation.
'I am not here to accuse anybody,' she said, 'I am here going over the things I think have not been and should be looked at'.
She said the William Tyrrell inquest 'needed to recall' witnesses, including the policewoman Mr Donoghue spoke to that morning.
Mr Donoghue was interviewed three times by police, but never called on to give evidence before NSW State Coroner Harriet Grahame.
(Richard Donoghue should not be confused with Robert Donohoe, of Taree, a convicted paedophile who did testify.)
Richard Donoghue's BMW was still at the tennis club at 9.42am, which police say is the real time and the CCTV was set nine minutes early
A minute later Richard Donoghue's car can be seen leaving the tennis club for home after he says he was told a child had gone missing
Moments later, Mr Donoghue's car has disappeared down the street as he drove back to Benaroon Drive more than an hour before William's foster mother dialled Triple-0
In an interview with a detective at Laurieton police station in February 2017, his third police interview, Richard Donoghue says he arrived at Kendall Tennis Club around 8.10am on the morning in question.
In that interview, he was shown CCTV images of himself and his car at the Kendall Tennis Club that same morning.
The interview, a second re-canvass of his original police statement in September 2014, includes a statement about why he left the tennis club that morning.
'The reason I came to leave the tennis club what that Wendy Hudson, who I knew was a police officer, received a telephone call on her mobile telephone,' Mr Donoghue said in the statement.
Ms Hudson did not play tennis with Mr Donoghue at the club that morning and was not on duty at the time.
'I saw her using the telephone. I do not know where we were standing other than being somewhere within the precinct of the tennis courts.
'After Wendy finished the call I heard her say something to make me think there was a child missing.
'I cannot recall if she said where the child was missing from.
'Wendy said she was going. I cannot recall if I left before or after her, however left shortly after that call.'
The time stamp on the iconic photo of William emitting a playful roar shows a difference between when the picture may have been taken and the real time
The neighbour told police the foster father (above, in a police walk through at Kendall) came into his yard to search for William and seemed 'agitated'
Mr Donoghue said that in his original statement he said he left the tennis club 'about 10.15am', but that he now accepted CCTV images of him show him leaving about half an hour earlier.
'Detective Senior Constable Roberts has told me that the camera time is incorrect and is 9 minutes slow,' his statement says.
'Detective Roberts has shown me eight images from the CCTV system at Kendall Tennis Club time stamped between 9:32:32am and 9:34:30 on the 12th September 2014.
'I agree that it is me in the images and that my vehicle, the stone coloured BMW, leaves the tennis club.
'If what Detective Roberts has told me about the time difference is correct, I agree these indicate I left the tennis club about 9.43am.'
Mr Donoghue later saw a man in his yard on Benaroon Drive - who was William's foster father - and that had influenced his belief that he had left the tennis club later than the time recorded on the CCTV cameras.
After returning home and having a cup of tea or coffee with his wife, he saw a man enter their yard.
He believes this was around 10.45am.
In their police statements, the foster mother said William disappearance around 10.30am, the foster father arrived back from his trip to Lakewood shortly afterward and before she called emergency services.
Richard Donoghue (circled) speaks with another patron at the Kendall Tennis Club on the morning that William Tyrrell vanished from the house a few minutes up the road
