Scott Grahame Guy

Who Killed Scott Guy? The case that gripped a Nation. Book written by Mike White Murder of Scott Guy From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Scott Guy, a New Zealand farmer, was shot to death at the gate of the family farm in Feilding, New Zealand on 8 July 2010. Six months later, his brother-in-law, Ewen Macdonald, was charged with the murder. Macdonald's wife was Scott Guy's sister Anna, and Scott had been best man at their wedding. Both men managed the Guys' family farm and surrounding properties on Aorangi Road a few miles from Feilding.

Macdonald was defended by high-profile defence lawyer Greg King. After a trial that captured the attention of the New Zealand media and public, Macdonald was found not guilty. King attributed the public's interest in the case to "unadulterated racism" as the victim and the accused were "good looking white people". Gregory James King committed suicide in Wellington on 2 November 2012 (17 sept 1969-2 Nov 2012 aged 43, married with two small children).

Background The police alleged that Macdonald had held a grudge against Scott after the latter returned from outback Australia in 2008 and said he wanted to inherit the farm. There was an ongoing rivalry between the two. Because of the tension, Scott's father Bryan Guy called a number of family meetings to clear the air. Scott was given responsibility for raising the calves and growing the crops for the cows. Macdonald was given responsibility for the dairy side of the business.[3] The tension appeared to have subsided and Bryan Guy reported that in the previous 12 months "everyone seemed to be getting along really well." Two weeks before the murder, MacDonald and Scott travelled to Invercargill together for a dairying conference. Nikki Guy, Scott's other sister, said the pair had a "fantastic time" At the trial, the Crown alleged Scott still wanted to take control of the farm and went to one particular family meeting with an agenda outlining his demands. The prosecutor claimed "this might as well have been his death warrant".[5]

One of the Guy's former farm workers, Callum Boe, subsequently told police that he and Macdonald used to go on hunting trips they referred to as "missions". He told police that on one mission in October 2008, they torched an old home on Scott's section.[3] In January 2009, about 18 months before the murder, they vandalised a home being built by Scott and his wife Kylee, causing $14,000 worth of damage. At the time no one but Boe and Macdonald knew who was responsible.

The murder Scott Guy was shot dead at the end of his driveway after he stopped to open a farm gate early in the morning of 8 July 2010. He died from shotgun wounds to his neck, face and arm. His body was discovered by truck driver David Berry at about 7.00am. Mr Berry called the police at 7.08am and then called his landlord, Bruce Johnstone. When Johnstone arrived, he took a quick look at the body and phoned Macdonald at 7.16am; two police cars soon arrived and Macdonald arrived on his quadbike shortly after that. Macdonald immediately rang Scott's father at 7.21am sounding distressed and incoherent.

The trial Crown prosecutor Ben Vanderkolk alleged Macdonald closed the farm gates which forced Guy to stop and get out of his vehicle. Vanderkolk said when Guy got out, Macdonald shot him in the throat and then in the face. Police believe the killing occurred at about 4.43am. Defence counsel Greg King said four nearby residents testified they were woken by 'bangs' at about 5am and since Macdonald was seen on the farm by farm worker Michael Ireland (who had arrived early to milking that morning and sat in his car for half and hour listening to his radio) at about 5am he could not have been the killer.

Vanderkolk alleged Macdonald used the farm shotgun and was wearing size 9 Proline dive boots while committing the crime. Macdonald allegedly then rode his bicycle back to the farm which was 1.46 km away, arriving just after 5am where he was milking the cows. Vanderkolk said Macdonald tried to make it look like a robbery by killing three Labrador puppies which were kept in a shed near the house. Police excavated some of the property where Macdonald lived looking for the dive boots, the dead puppies and the shotgun cartridges but found nothing.[9]

Defence counsel, Greg King, questioned forensic expert David Neale about the size of the footprints found at the scene. Neale told the Court there were more than 50 footprints next to Guy's body, and they were all made by size 9 Proline boots. King said the 33 wavy rows on the plaster impressions of the boots presented by the police were not compatible with size 9. King also challenged prosecution evidence about the shotgun. Crown witnesses told the Court they heard three shots in succession but King called an American shooting champion as an expert witness. This witness said it was not possible for the farm shotgun to be fired that quickly and suggested a semi-automatic weapon had been used.[9]

King also said a car seen near the house matched one stolen by an offender with a history of shotgun crimes. He also questioned other aspects of the prosecution's case, "including the theft of shotguns in the area, a string of local burglaries, and a man who smelled of alcohol and cigarettes who came looking for Mr Guy at his old home days before his death".

The verdict The high-profile case took the attention of the public for nearly two years. The trial lasted four weeks and was scrutinised in detail by the media. During the trial, the public gallery was usually full with up to 100 people sometimes lined up outside hoping to get a glimpse of the proceedings.

The jury deliberated for 11 hours and found Macdonald not guilty. After a short break Justice Simon France remanded Macdonald for a sentencing date on other charges. The jury were not told about these charges as the judge said they would have been prejudicial to a fair trial.

A year later, Scott's father, Bryan Guy insisted that justice had prevailed. He said he didn't want the case to drag on for years without being solved and made a plea to his son's killer to give himself up.

Subsequent events There were a number of other outstanding charges. In June 2007 Macdonald and Callum Boe killed 19 calves belonging to a farmer who had caught them poaching his deer. Macdonald was also convicted for burning down an old whare (Maori hut) and emptying thousands of dollars' worth of milk from a vat on another neighbour's farm. These acts were committed against the farmers "for retribution" after Macdonald and Boe were trespassed from their farms. Anna Macdonald testified at the murder trial that her husband's relationship with Boe was 'immature', and she was unaware of what they were doing on their regular night "missions". When police found out about these missions, they visited Callum Boe who by this time had moved to Queenstown. Boe admitted to his involvement and, in the process, provided police with an insight into Macdonald's behaviour. They arrested Macdonald and charged him with the murder soon afterwards.

In September 2012, Macdonald was jailed for five years. He was eligible to attend his first parole hearing in December 2012. On 3 November 2012, Macdonald's well known lawyer Greg King was found dead in Wellington. The finding of the coroner, released in October 2013, was that the death had been a suicide, he was 43 years old, married with 2 small daughters.

In November 2014, it was reported that Macdonald had been denied parole a third time and his term of imprisonment may run until completion of sentence on 6 April 2016.

On 16 October 2015, it was announced that Macdonald was granted parole at his fourth appearance before a parole board on 13 October. Macdonald was freed from prison on 2 November 2015 and was subject to strict terms of parole (eg that he was not allowed in the North Island, NZ). Divorced from his first wife Anna Helen MacDonald nee Guy, Ewen Kerry MacDonald married Joyce Braas when he was released from prison.

Simon Bradwell: Who Killed Scott Guy? (Book review) SEP 18, 2013 1 NEWS Mike White was perfectly placed to write the definitive account of the murder mystery that gripped the country last year.

The award-winning North & South writer was the only journalist to have the trust and co-operation of the family of Ewen Macdonald, the man accused and ultimately acquitted of the murder of Feilding farmer Scott Guy. He also had unique access to Macdonald's defence team, led by Greg King.

Macdonald, you'll scarcely need reminding, was the brother-in-law of Scott Guy and accused then cleared of murdering him over a farm feud and out of personal animosity.

White also sat in on every day of the court hearing that dominated media coverage for a month.

Sadly, he's failed to take advantage of that opportunity.

"Who Killed Scott Guy?" not only fails to live up to its title by solving the mystery, but is unfortunately a sympathetic and one-sided account of the case.

Despite criticising armchair experts who drew conclusions based on snippets of news coverage, White himself only summarises the evidence in much the same way that news outlets were forced to.

He says it's impossible for people to judge the case without being in court, then basically invites readers to do exactly that.

Much of the court detail will be familiar ground to followers of coverage: the dive boots, the number of shots, the puppies, the rivalry on the farm, the farm worker who arrived early to milk that fatefull morning and sat in his car for half an hour listening to music (he was able to testify that Ewen MacDonald came out of his house rather than arriving back on a push bike).

It's boosted by comments from the Macdonald family - much of which has already appeared in the magazine White writes for.

No surprises there, and no surprise that they're totally supportive of their son.

There are also written comments from Macdonald about the trial - White applied but was denied permission to interview him in prison.

It's frustrating, because the full account could so easily have been achieved.

Simply by approaching and including the Guy family for input - and possibly Kylee Guy, Scott's widow as well.

The Guys, the most agreeable of people, would surely have contributed a most valuable perspective - even if they are working on their own book, due for release next month.

Anna Guy too, might have been willing to comment - certainly she has to women's magazines and other media.

White mentions that police have not commented on the case, other than their court-steps reaction on the day of the verdict - but doesn't make it clear if he made a fresh approach.

There's a few omissions too, that aren't totally supportive of Macdonald. Even his slaughter of bobby calves is given sympathetic treatment, although the workers who came across the scene found some of them alive and badly wounded. His torching of a 100 yr old whare and dumping to thousands of litres of milk.

What's left is the case very much through the eyes of the Macdonalds and the defence.

And if that's the case, don't go calling your book "Who Killed Scott Guy?" as if it's a neutral examination of the whodunit.

There's a whiff of cash-in about it all. Certainly, Kylee's family think that's the case.

White clearly feels that on the evidence, the jury got it right, no-one questioned why the young farm worker would arrive so early to sit in his car in the middle of winter. The Crown case was flimsy and Greg King dismantled it. The book pays credit to that, but at the expense of neutrality.

White also suggests police focussed too much on Macdonald, and ignored other possibilities. That is a stretch. Police had every reason to treat Macdonald as the prime suspect, once they found out about the feelings between the two men, and in particular the extensive and vicious vandalism of the dream home Kylee and Scott were building by Ewen MacDonald and another young farm worker he had managed to drag into the crime.

Not only that of course, but Macdonald lied about the crime smoothly and naturally until confronted with the testimony of his accomplice worker, young Callum Boe.

The police investigation was vast. The simple truth is, it failed to identify anyone with a real grudge against the young father, let alone a motive for murder.

The alternative arguments put forward by the defence at trial are given considerable weight, more than they were at the actual hearing.

Criticism of police seems petulant. Surprisingly, White is more generous of prosecutor Ben Vanderkolk, who many observers felt was unconvincing in court.

Whether it was rushed into print ahead of the Guy family book or not, White's writing doesn't meet the standard he's set with his magazine copy.

There is some new information - particularly about evidence the defence decided not to use - but no bombshells. Even the photographs, many taken by White himself, aren't new.

It's a shame that White didn't, or couldn't attend Macdonald's parole hearing. It might have helped him understand his subject.

Supporters of Macdonald won't be disappointed by the book. But anyone who truly wants to unravel the mystery, and was relying on White's access and knowledge to guide them, sadly will be.

Simon Bradwell covered the Scott Guy case for ONE News throughout the trial. He has written several articles on the subject.