Kylee Guy’s plea for answers
Ten years after he was killed, Scott Guy’s widow, Kylee, has issued a fresh appeal for anyone with information on one of New Zealand’s highest-profile unsolved killings to come forward.
‘‘I would like to thank all of those people who continue to support us but ask that, please, if you have any information that could help the police bring justice for Scott, please, I’m begging you to share it,’’ she said to Stuff. ‘‘We deserve to know what happened.’’
She said not a day went by when she didn’t think about Scott.
The 31-year-old Feilding farmer was shot dead at the gates of his property while on the way to work at the family farm early on July 8, 2010.
At the time, Kylee and young son Hunter were in bed, oblivious to what had happened. She was heavily pregnant with their second son, Drover, who was born just over two months later.
‘‘We will always love you, our cowboy,’’ Kylee, Hunter and Drover said of Scott in their statement. The trio live in Hawke’s Bay with Kylee’s new partner, with whom she had a son in 2015.
‘‘It feels just like yesterday and, while it has been 10 years, there is not a day that goes by that we don’t think about our darling Scotty,’’ Kylee said.
‘‘Taking one day at a time to survive this nightmare, I concentrate on raising my three beautiful sons and keeping life as normal as it can be for them.’’
Kylee spoke of the effect of not knowing who killed Scott was having on the family. ‘‘It is not fair that every day we are left to wonder how and why our lives were devastated.
‘‘Our sons need answers so they can stop wondering and start living their teenage lives without these questions hanging over their heads any longer.’’
Scott and Kylee Guy, nee Bullock, wed in 2005 and Hunter was born three years later.
Scott Guy’s brother-in-law, Ewen Macdonald, was acquitted of his murder at a high-profile trial in Wellington in 2012. The Crown argued jealousies over the family farm drove Macdonald to kill.
Lawyers for Kylee Guy requested a coronial inquest into the shooting but then-Palmerston North coroner Carla na Nagara declined. She said it would ‘‘undermine the integrity’’ of the justice system if Macdonald were compelled to give evidence after he had exercised his right to silence during his trial.
The coroner ruled Scott’s death was either a ‘‘random or opportunistic act’’ or was ‘‘related to issues firmly rooted in his private or personal life’’.
Bryan and Jo Guy measure time in two phases – before their son Scott was killed and after.
In the early hours of July 8, 2010, Scott Guy was shot dead at the end of his rural driveway as he prepared for a day’s work on the family farm near Feilding.
The 31-year-old husband to Kylee was a father to one young son, Hunter, with another, Drover, on the way. The shooting remains unsolved.
Speaking from their home of four years near Colyton, in rural Manawatu¯ , Scott’s parents say a lot had changed in the decade since. ‘‘We don’t really look at it as an anniversary, because every day we think of Scott,’’ Bryan says. ‘‘There is not a day gone past in that 10 years that we haven’t thought of him. Not that we think of him all day long but it still comes into our mind.
‘‘Our whole lives have changed. We measure time before Scott was killed and after Scott was killed.’’
Jo says she likes to think she and Bryan are more empathetic since losing Scott, one of their four children alongside Anna, Nikki and Callum.
Life can spiral when she looks back at what happened, so Jo has to stop and think about what she can focus on, a mantra that keeps her and Bryan going.
It is part of their determination not to become bitter about the hand dealt to them and to, as Jo puts it, live alongside their grief. ‘‘Sometimes it hurts more, some days it doesn’t but 10 years doesn’t really mean anything because a piece of us has gone. Scott was part of us. It is like this piece of your heart is missing.’’
Bryan says some memories from 2010 are clear but others have faded. ‘‘And sometimes things will jog your memory. At the time it was pretty traumatic of course when Scott was killed. I still had the farm to run so there was no choice. You couldn’t just curl up into a ball and feel sorry for yourself.’’
Scott’s death quickly became national news and his family made public appeals for information. The trickle of information to the police slowed and in early 2011 the team investigating the murder was downsized. Then, in early February that year, police revealed a new house being built for Scott and Kylee Guy was vandalised in 2009.
It was later found Scott’s brother-in-law, Ewen Macdonald, Anna’s husband, and farm worker Callum Boe were responsible.
In April 2011, Macdonald was arrested and charged with Scott’s murder. He was acquitted at a trial in Wellington the year after.
The trial heard about a rift between Macdonald and Scott over how the farm was run, as the
Guys’ family life was laid bare.
Macdonald was jailed for the vandalism and other crimes.
Police say the homicide case file remains open, although ‘‘no specific staff are currently dedicated to the investigation’’.
Bryan and Jo say they can’t dwell on nobody being brought to justice for killing Scott.
Tragically, they can look to their own family for a comparison. Scott’s cousin, Andy Marshall, was pushed out a second-storey window of a Perth pub in 2011 by Stefan Schmidt, who was found guilty of manslaughter and jailed. ‘‘With Jo’s sister and husband, Alan and Wendy, when they had a trial they knew who pushed their son out the window, and he was found guilty, and they didn’t feel any better than what we felt. It doesn’t bring Scott back,’’ Bryan says.
‘‘Sometimes it would be good to see it finished,’’ Jo adds. The pair have no interest in reinvestigating the homicide case themselves.
The pair remain resolute in their focus on family, especially their 14 grandchildren, which includes Elsie, daughter of Nikki and her partner James, who died aged two weeks in 2013.
Remembering Elsie, like remembering Scott, is important, the Guys say, because talking about someone keeps a part of them alive.