'Truth will come out' — Scott Guy's parents still hope 15 years on

Fifteen years after Feilding farmer Scott Guy was shot dead, his parents remain hopeful the truth about what happened that cold winter morning will emerge.

Bryan and Jo Guy say their lives are now divided into two parts — before Scott was killed, and after.

The second part is hard to navigate, but they are determined not to be ruled by bitterness, and instead keep Scott's memory alive.

Scott Guy was 31. He and wife Kylee had a young son and another on the way when he was fatally shot at the foot of his driveway when he left for work on the morning of July 8, 2010.

His normally opened gates were shut. When Scott Guy jumped out of his ute to fix them, the killer emerged from the darkness and shot him.

Scott Guy's brother-in-law Ewen Macdonald was in 2011 arrested for his murder, but was found not guilty after a high-profile trial in Wellington a year later.

The killing remains unsolved, but Scott's mother Jo Guy thinks the truth will emerge, and she shares a quote she found to illustrate this.

"Whatever secrets are buried, it eventually claws its way out of the ground," the quote says.

"I reckon the truth will come out, but when it does is out of our control. It would be good to have the closure, but it still doesn't change not having Scott," Jo Guy said.

The 67-year-old Jo and husband Bryan, 70, moved from their family farm nine years ago to a house near Colyton, in rural Manawatū, where RNZ spoke to them next to a roaring fire.

"Sometimes it seems to have been a long time, 15 years, and other times it seems like it was only yesterday," Bryan Guy said.

"Back in 2010, when Scott was killed, our lives changed so much then that really we look at life now as before Scott was killed and after Scott was killed."

Pictures of Scott sit on a shelf, and next to them hangs a cowboy hat he used to wear.

"It was kind of hard to get used to. For a long time I used to say, Where do I fit? Because you feel so different and you change so much," Jo Guy said.

"Then you want to go back to the way you were and the type of person you were, and you can't go back. It took me ages to change from that."

Days after Scott Guy was killed Bryan and Jo made a public appeal for information at a press conference in front of the nation's television cameras and microphones.

From then on the family remained firmly in the spotlight during the police investigation, then Macdonald's trial, as it was revealed he had vandalised property belonging to Scott and Kylee.

Jo Guy said she felt like a gutted fish, given so much of the family's personal lives were prised open and examined, although Bryan said they found positives.

"In a bizarre sort of way it hadn't been a bad thing because it means we've talked about Scott a lot and talked a lot about what we've been through, whereas so many people will have a tragedy in their lives and can't often share it with everyone.

"By being forced to share what we've been through it can be quite a cathartic experience, really."

The Guys said they have received plenty of support from loved ones and the wider public alike down the years.

They are parents to four children and 14 grandchildren, and that support, as well as family and love had helped.

Bryan Guy has just returned from an eight-day Outward Bound adventure with Scott and Kylee's younger son, Drover.

This included the pair spending two nights alone together in the wilderness, with no phones but many thoughts.

"One of the things I thought was how great this experience was, being away with Drover for the week, doing things I never thought I would be doing or being pushed out of my comfort zone," Bryan Guy said.

"But then I also thought, We have these plan As in life, that we want to do this and do that, and we set these goals, but sometimes these don't always happen and we have to go to plan B.

"I thought really plan A was having Scott there. It shouldn't have been me on this course. It should have been Scott. I shed a few tears over that, actually."

Bryan Guy was awarded a King's Service Medal recently for services to the community, volunteering his time at the local Anglican church and hospice board, among other organisations.

Jo Guy is a published children's author, with a chapter book in the works. She regularly speaks in schools, drawing on her and her family's experiences since Scott's death, especially those of her grandchildren and what they've faced.

She said she often spoke to children about the concept of finding a "lighthouse person" — someone who shone brightly and who youngsters could look towards for guidance or support.

The Guys have also regularly spoken about striving for forgiveness and living with grief.

"I think it's when it's anniversaries or birthdays. That's when you have to keep choosing to forgive. If we don't, we're in big trouble, really," Jo Guy said.

"It's hard not to think about it sometimes and as soon as I start thinking about what happened and everything, and start spiralling down and going down a rabbit hole, you think, I can't do that."

Bryan Guy added: "The grief doesn't go away either, but you learn to live with it.

"People often talk about closure or getting over a death or a tragedy. It doesn't really happen like that.

"You don't get over these things, and grief, I've heard it described like a pebble in your shoe. You can walk along and get it in a position where you don't notice it too often and suddenly you shift and you feel it."

Every year on July 8 the Guys would have afternoon tea with family members and visit Scott's grave.

"[We] often think that he's forever young and we see some of his friends that are his peers and think what would he look like at 46, when we only see him as 31," Bryan Guy said.

"He's always forever young in our hearts, that's for sure."

Jo Guy said a child was etched in any parent's soul.

"Bryan and I had the same tooth out [as each other], down the bottom, because root canals didn't work. Not having Scott around is like having this big gap in your mouth, it's always there.

"He leaves a huge gap in our family. We've learned to adjust to it, but for a long time it didn't feel right. The family dynamics changed and you're missing this big personality."

But the wider family make sure he is not forgotten — even Scott Guy's nephews and nieces born since 2010 talk about what Uncle Scott would think about an event or milestone.

"We think about him every day. There's no doubt about that," Bryan Guy said.

Police said they last reviewed the case file in 2022, looking at "all information gathered during the original investigation".

"Police [are] satisfied the review was thorough and no further actions resulted."

rnz.co.nz