Scott Guy, a 31-year-old farmer, was shot dead at the end of his driveway on the family farm on Aorangi Road near Feilding, Manawatū-Whanganui, New Zealand, in the early morning of 8 July 2010. He had stopped to open a farm gate when he was shot in the neck, face, and arm. His body was discovered around 7:00 am by a truck driver, David Berry, who alerted police and the property's associates.
Guy managed the family farm alongside his brother-in-law, Ewen Macdonald, who was married to Guy's sister Anna. The two men had a history of tension: in 2008 Guy told a family meeting he expected to inherit the farm, which the Crown later argued created friction with Macdonald. The defence maintained that by 2010 the relationship had improved, citing a recent trip the two took together to a dairying conference.
Six months after the killing, Macdonald was charged with murder. The case drew sustained national media and public attention for nearly two years before the trial began. At trial, the prosecution, led by Ben Vanderkolk, alleged Macdonald closed the farm gates to force Guy to stop, shot him with the farm's shotgun while wearing size 9 Proline dive boots, and staged the scene to look like a robbery by taking three missing Labrador puppies. Boot prints at the scene were the principal forensic evidence linking Macdonald to the crime.
Defence lawyer Greg King challenged the Crown case on several fronts, including witness testimony that placed Macdonald on the farm around the time of the shooting, an expert's assertion that the shotgun could not have fired the three shots some neighbours reported hearing, and disputes over the boot-print sizing. The defence also raised other uninvestigated leads, including unidentified vehicles seen near the farm and other individuals with possible motives or histories of shotgun-related crime.
In July 2012, after 11 hours of deliberation, a jury found Macdonald not guilty of murder. He was later sentenced to five years' imprisonment on unrelated charges connected to prior acts of vandalism and animal killings committed with an associate, Callum Boe. Macdonald was released on parole in November 2015.
Guy's wife, Kylee Guy, later funded a private investigation into the killing, which was called off after 18 months due to funding constraints. The investigator noted unexplained phone calls to Scott Guy around the time of his death that were not fully examined by police.
Defence lawyer Greg King died by suicide in November 2012, four months after the trial concluded; a coroner's finding released in 2013 confirmed the cause of death.
As of the most recent reporting, Scott Guy's killer has not been identified or convicted. New Zealand Police have treated the case as closed and are not actively pursuing other suspects.
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