Almost two weeks on and Police are still no further forward in the search for the killers of Feilding Farmer Scott Guy.
Mr Guy, aged 31, was found shot in the throat on the driveway of his Feilding farm on the morning of 8 July 2010. His brutal and violent death devastated his young family, leaving his young pregnant wife Kylee without a life partner she was devoted to and their 2 year old son Hunter without an adored father.
Since the shooting information has gradually emerged that the Guy’s Aorangi Rd home was extensively vanadalised in January 2009 during its construction. An old farmhouse previously on the property had been burned to the ground in a “suspicious fire” in October 2008 and in the two months previous to that items had been stolen from it.
According to a report released today three chocolate Labrador puppies*, out of a litter of eight, went missing from a building on the farm sometime between 5pm on 7 July and Mr Guy’s death the following morning.
The building where the puppies were kept is said to have been around 80 metres from where Mr Guy was shot. As far as we know nothing else was taken from the property at the time Mr Guy died and there appears to be no motive for the murder.
Fliers advertising the puppies’ sale had been left in local businesses at the end of June. However, it has taken almost two weeks for police to release that information and ask the public for help in finding them.
A neighbour has told the Manawatu Standard that she’d locked her doors after hearing a loud car racing down the street about 10.30pm on 7 July:
“It was doing laps around Aorangi Rd and Durie St (ed. Durie Road?) and this is unusual as we don’t see many people out here at that time of the night,” she said.The paper went on to add that an email was circulated to residents in the area warning about a recent attempted burglary of a shed.
TVNZ reported last night that there were rumours in the town that Mr Guy had confronted gang members after finding and destroying cannabis plants on his farm.
Despite Feilding being a tight-knit community no one has come forward with any tip-offs or information for the police and Mr Guy’s wife and child have gone into hiding. (read police disappointed with silence)
Aorangi Road, although rural in nature, is very close to the conurbation of Feilding and the family lived toward the north eastern end of the road:
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*Purebred Chocolate Labrador puppies are valuable dogs. One litter in nearby Palmerston North is currently being advertised on TradeMe at $600 a puppy.
Read also: Safety becoming a necessity for farmers – “The murder of Manawatu farmer Scott Guy is being described as an unfortunate sign of the times….”
The idea that crime is in the cities can be set aside in New Zealand. Living in a rural area will not save you from crime, and in fact it is simply farther from the police station.
ReplyDeleteThe local paper reported just the other day a large number of steel gates had been taken off their hinges in the rural area surrounding the town, and a couple schools were broken into and equipment stolen, and the usual drunken driving, pot busts, assaults, DV, etc. You cannot escape the rural poverty and problems by moving to some small spot that seems to be more "civilised". Such as a moneyed lifestyle town. All the vacant unsold properties are attracting crime, and only a few minutes out of town the agriculture starts - sheep and dope!
People from outside of NZ just don't appreciate how bad crime is in rural areas.
ReplyDeleteSomehow they equate low population density with low crime, which is a popular misconception. As you pointed out rural areas are simply further from police stations, many of which keep regular office hours anyway.
This post in November 2009 highlights this problem, it exists even in the Prime Minister's own constituency : http://emigratetonewzealand.blogspot.com/2009/11/more-responses-to-is-crime-serious.html
There is no doubt this issue also afffects the rural communities around Feilding. Add in the complications presented by established gang activity in the region and it's easy to see why police stations perhaps shut-up shop when the sun goes down.
The local community have clammed up and refused to dob-in the people responsible for Mr Guy's death, it's interesting that it's taken the publication of photos of cute missing puppies to generate leads. Do people in NZ care more about their animals than they do their neighbours?
ReplyDeleteThere was a similar murder of a farmer, Jack Nicholas in August 2004. He was also found shot to death on his drive, in Hawkes Bay. Murray Foreman was prosecuted for his murder but was acquitted, the case remains open.