A man who went on a shooting and stabbing spree in the Scottish Highlands has been found guilty of murdering his brother-in-law and attempting to kill three other people.
Warning: This article contains details readers may find distressing
Finlay MacDonald, 41, repeatedly stabbed his wife, Rowena MacDonald, 34, during an attack at their home on the Isle of Skye and left her lying drenched in her own blood on the driveway in front of their young children.
MacDonald then drove to his sister’s home on the other side of the Sleat peninsula, where he fatally shot his brother-in-law John MacKinnon, 47.
The killer’s sister, Lyn-Anne MacKinnon, 45, told a court her husband’s “innards were all hanging out” following the attack.
MacDonald then set off for the mainland and the village of Dornie, Wester Ross, where he shot married couple Fay and John MacKenzie before being apprehended.
The events took place on 10 August 2022.
MacDonald denied each of the charges and lodged a special defence against the prosecution’s murder charge, claiming his “ability to determine or control his conduct was substantially impaired by reason of abnormality of mind”.
Jurors were told MacDonald could be convicted of an alternative and lesser charge of culpable homicide if the jury believed his defence of diminished responsibility.
During MacDonald’s trial at the High Court in Edinburgh, his wife explained how the couple’s relationship “was not in a good place” at the time of the incident and she had been planning to move out.
Jurors were told MacDonald confronted his wife over messages on her phone to her male boss, where she had discussed the ending of their marriage and said “this can’t come soon enough now”.
Although Mrs MacDonald claimed her colleague was merely a friend, MacDonald produced a knife from his pocket and launched into a frenzied attack.
Mrs MacDonald told the court: “Both lungs had been punctured – with every breath I took I was openly squelching blood.”
The couple’s young children helped to keep their mother conscious at home in Tarskavaig until emergency services arrived and airlifted her to the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow.
When eventually interviewed by police, MacDonald claimed he had suffered a “moment of madness”.
He explained he “didn’t know” what he was going to do when he got into his car with a shotgun, “a couple of hundred” cartridges and a knife, but that he began thinking about grievances with his brother-in-law and osteopath.
He said: “I never started the day with the intention of doing anything other than try and save my marriage. I didn’t want to do any of it.
“I wasn’t the person I normally am. It all just went to madness.
“Something went off in my head and I just felt like I had become someone else.”
Jurors were told of how an alleged assault at the hands of Mr MacKinnon in 2013 was the beginning of MacDonald’s “problems”.
Mrs MacKinnon explained the “altercation” between her husband and brother occurred after MacDonald threw a birthday gift back at her “in a rage” while she was heavily pregnant, which was reportedly witnessed by her children.
MacDonald was said to have felt humiliated and left with low self-esteem following the incident.
On the day of the shooting, MacDonald arrived at Mr MacKinnon’s home in Teangue where he was said to have confronted the distillery worker over being “bullied”.
MacDonald claimed his brother-in-law “came towards” him and he shot him twice, once in the front and once in the side.
Mrs MacKinnon, who had spotted her younger brother enter the family home with a gun before hearing the blasts, tried to save her husband’s life.
MacDonald then travelled to the home of osteopath Mr MacKenzie, who he had previously visited for treatment of a back injury which had seen him signed off work sick.
The court heard how MacDonald became obsessed with suing Mr MacKenzie, also known as John Don, over the treatment which he claimed left him in “chronic pain” and took his “life chances away”.
MacDonald also told police how his marriage suffered as a result of his deteriorating mental and physical health.
The court heard how MacDonald shot Mrs MacKenzie through the house window.
She fled to the bathroom and was joined by her husband before MacDonald arrived.
Mrs MacKenzie said: “He shot John Don at point blank range and we both fell down onto the shower area.
“He was standing there, the man, and I thought, this is it, this is us going to be killed but then my husband rose up and took the gun off the man.”
Mrs MacKenzie then grabbed a “hefty” metal toilet roll holder and used it to hit MacDonald until the police arrived.
The court heard at the time of the events, MacDonald had undiagnosed autism spectrum disorder, personality disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder and was experiencing low mood and anxiety.
Forensic psychologist Lorraine Johnstone told jurors the disorders would not have significantly impaired MacDonald’s ability to control his actions.
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Meanwhile, clinical psychologist Dr Harry Wood said his behaviour was consistent with an individual focused on himself and his own plan and was not displaying the usual degree of empathy.
During the trial’s closing speeches, prosecutor Liam Ewing KC argued MacDonald’s behaviour after stabbing his wife showed he was “fully in control of and able to determine his actions”.
Defence lawyer Donald Findlay KC claimed his client’s autism affected the way he reacted after discovering the “flirty” messages between his wife and her boss.
Mr Findlay stated: “He’s autistic. He could not rationalise it the way other people can.”
He also noted there was “no evidence of planning” involved in MacDonald’s actions that day, putting it to the jury that had the text messages “not existed”, none of the shootings would have occurred.
Mr Findlay said in stabbing his wife, MacDonald had “at his own hands been party to his whole world being destroyed”, and he had then set out to attack those whom he had “fixated” upon as the “cause of all his troubles”.
