A Sydney man acquitted of killing his young boyfriend, Matthew Leveson, was secretly recorded by a mutual friend after the 20-year-old's disappearance, an inquest has heard.
The recording was played at the NSW inquest on Monday after it was discovered with a stash of other evidence in a box by police on February 25.
The friend, labelled with the pseudonym "Sally White", wore a police wire when she approached Michael Atkins with questions about his missing boyfriend over a dinner at his home on December 5, 2007.
Mr Leveson was last seen leaving Darlinghurst's ARQ nightclub with Mr Atkins, 44, in the early hours of September 23, 2007.
In the recording Ms White said police showed her CCTV of Mr Atkins buying duct tape and a mattock the day Mr Leveson disappeared, the inquest heard.
"I told them that," Mr Atkins responded.
But Ms White pressed further: "You told me that you were sleeping at that time".
He said he had been sleeping, but only a part of the day.
"I just want him to be next to me," he later added.
Ms White then said she wanted answers and had been crying herself to sleep.
"If you have done something, and I'm not saying you have ... you better hope police don't find anything," she says.
Mr Atkins faced trial over his lover's death but was acquitted by a jury in 2009.
A previously unseen excerpt of video footage from a search warrant of the pair's home on September 27, 2007, was also played at the inquest.
The inquest heard the 48-minute excerpt wasn't played because it showed drugs and cash being seized from the home.
Footage showed police searching the pair's home as they discovered drugs, believed to be ecstasy and GHB, in the kitchen, along with $3755 cash.
"It's Matt's," Mr Atkins tells police.
"He's been doing it a while."
The inquest is set to resume on Tuesday.
