By 3 News online staff
Evidence withheld from the jury in Scott Guy murder trial included comments reportedly made by Mr Guy about his brother-in-law Ewen Macdonald.
Mr Guy told his sister Nikki Guy that he disliked Macdonald, describing him as “the worst thing that happened to our family,” according to court documents obtained by The New Zealand Herald.
She told police her brother said he believed the family farm in Feilding would be better off if Mr Macdonald wasn’t there.
The comments were allegedly made during a trip to a concert in 2008, more than a year-and-a-half before he was shot dead.
However, Ms Guy never gave evidence on the comments in court because they were withheld from the jury.
Defence lawyer Greg King successfully challenged the reliability of the evidence, drawing Justice Simon France’s attention to the fact that Ms Guy had told police about the comments only after Macdonald’s arrest.
Justice France also noted the circumstances of the alleged conversation, saying Mr Guy was “intoxicated and probably affected by drugs” at the time, and turned down an application from Crown prosecutor Ben Vandervolk for the evidence to be heard in the second week of the trial.
Macdonald was later found not guilty of murdering Scott Guy.
He is yet to be sentenced on a further six charges to which he has already plead guilty.
Details of those crimes were made public this week.
Among the crimes it was revealed that Macdonald and his accomplice Callum Boe snuck onto Manawatu farmer Nigel Sexton’s farm to poach his rare Sambar deer – a cunning animal notoriously hard to hunt.
Watch the full interview with Nigel Sexton.
Ewen Macdonald Police interviews
3 News