Killer Mark Garson jailed for life for murdering Sean McKinnon in Raglan

A man who shot and killed an Australian surfer in his caravan in Raglan has been sentenced to life in prison with a minimum probation period of 15.5 years.

Mark Ronald Garson, 24, unexpectedly pleaded guilty in October after being tried in November for the murder of Sean McKinnon and threatening to kill his partner Bianca Buckley.

Garson approached them in his trailer during the early hours of August 16 of last year.

The couple had rented the caravan and driven to Raglan, deciding to spend the night parked in the gorge, which has panoramic views of the Tasman Sea.

During the first hours they were awakened by banging on the window.

Some members of McKinnon’s family watched this morning’s proceedings through an audiovisual link, while his sisters Emmeline and Mary made the trip down the Tasman to look Garson in the eye and share their grief in the courtroom.

Buckley was the first to share her statement in the Hamilton Supreme Court this morning, shocking Garson, who then wiped the tears from his face and bowed in pain, as she turned midway to go over the gruesome details of that night.

She told him how they heard him hitting on the side and around the caravan, saying “I know you’re there.”

Lying there naked, Buckley said McKinnon stuck his head out and asked how he could help him, “in a non-threatening way.”

“He tried to offer her a solution. Sean would have helped anyone … he would have given them everything they needed.”

Buckley told Garson he had a bad feeling about him while muttering “something like ‘I have a gun.’

Garson then demanded the keys to the motorhome before smashing a window, and Buckley eventually cut himself from the glass, his naked body bleeding.

“Sean tried to reason with you … and without warning you shot him, straight through the liver, at point blank range.

“He groaned and said, ‘Dude, you shot me.’

However, McKinnon continued to search for the keys as blood spurted from his body and tried to defuse the situation.

“Then, without warning, you shot him in the base of his skull, killing him instantly.”

She said she could only watch him collapse to the ground “watching his life leave him.”

“Then I realized that I was alone with you and your deadly weapon.”

Buckley managed to stumble out of the truck, covered not just in his blood but McKinnon’s, and stood before Garson naked with his hands raised.

“I didn’t know what to do. I was surprised that a human being could do that … I begged him for mercy, saying, ‘He’s dead.’

“You replied, ‘Yes, bitch, he’s dead.’ You said that. I’ll never forget you said that. You knew what you were doing.”

Garson then forced her back into the trailer to find the keys while pointing the gun at her back, cursing and calling out to her.

Then he said, “I’m not going to kill you, just give me the damn keys.”

She finally found the keys and asked Garson if she could have a moment with her fiancé before he left.

“No, I’ll take care of him,” Garson replied.

“You were so cruel,” he told her.

Garson then left and Buckley started running towards Raglan by the side of the cliff, hoping he wouldn’t come back.

She told Garson that what he did “shocked the world” with a series of events that not even the director of a horror movie could write.

Garson had destroyed her life and her dream with McKinnon, which was to include a wedding and eventually children.

“I am forever changed.”

Garson fled in the trailer and dumped it on the roadside near Gordonton, on the outskirts of Hamilton.

McKinnon’s body was still inside.

Roderick James Finlayson was sentenced to six months in community detention for supplying the weapon.

Family members speak

McKinnon’s sister, Emmeline, also turned to speak to Garson near the end of her statement.

She looked him in the eye and told him that she could have left her brother to get attention or at least take her last breath under the stars.

“To face the heavens so that Sean could return to the heavens,” she told him.

His sister Mary told the court that she could never reconcile her brother’s death and that her life would never be the same again.

“Since Sean left, I feel like someone has turned off the sun.”

He said the blood had drained from him and a great weight had been removed.

Holding back tears, she labeled his death senseless, cruel, and unprovoked; It happened for no reason.

Having run to him when he needed him since she was a child, Mary, now a doctor, said she was of no use to her brother when he needed her most.

Instead, they left him to die alone on a cold, isolated road.

She said that neither she nor her family were not used to death, her father died when Sean was 20 years old. But at least the family was by his side when he died, he said.

“I’d give anything to see him … lie next to him in the sun.

“He belonged to us … our brother, our uncle, our son, and he was important.”

His other sister, Jess, speaking through an audiovisual link, said that her brother was never judgmental and was full of life.

“Sean’s death is on my mind constantly throughout the day and when I go to sleep. I can’t even sleep.

“My heart feels like it has been broken on a daily basis.”

Her death had affected her ability to socialize, be a mother, and also her relationships.

Lachlan, Sean’s brother, said they were more than brothers, “we were best friends.”

His death had also had a “devastating effect on my daily life.”

His thoughts are consumed with pain, but soon after followed by hatred and the question, “why, why?”

“Sean was a kind and loving party guy. He was generous to the extreme.”

‘Pointless act’

Garson’s attorney, Charles Bean, said the shooting was not a hate crime or revenge crime, and his client was still puzzled as to why he pulled the trigger.

Said he was in Raglan with a loaded shotgun to shoot himself.

“He made an arrangement for his friend to kill him that night. We know that Mark Garson got stuck in Raglan … is that while using meth, his friend had returned to his motor vehicle and left.

“It’s not an excuse, but it provides a different context to other acts like this.

“Mark Garson didn’t take a gun with any plan. He didn’t get it to commit a robbery.

“This gun was bought for Mark Garson to kill himself.”

Bean said his client was using methamphetamine and suffering from depression at the time.

Since then, he had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

“It’s not an excuse, but it certainly explains why, in the context of this senseless act, there was a firearm in Raglan that night.”

Bean said there was nothing he or his client could say that “could lessen the real tragedy of what happened here.”

As for Garson’s story, at 12 he was addicted to cannabis and at 15 he was becoming addicted to methamphetamine.

He couldn’t remember, since he was 20 years old, when he had no addiction problems, and at 24 “he was suffering from his own delusions … in the weeks leading up to this it took multiple attempts on his own life.”

His client had written letters of apology, but knew it was unlikely that he would receive forgiveness from the family.

Regarding the delay in filing a guilty plea, he said Garson was not mentally well enough to receive instructions until 2020 and then his appointments were repeatedly postponed until he finally saw a specialist in August, and Bean received a report in September.

The earliest he could get to court to plead guilty was Oct. 7.

He urged the judge to issue a minimum 10-year parole-free period.

‘Makes a desperately sad read’

Judge Christine Gordon said she was surprised by the victim’s impact statements, including the link Buckley had with McKinnon.

“He had found the person he would be with for the rest of his life.”

The close bond that McKinnon’s family had was also evident, he said.

“It will be many years before they can accept the pain they are suffering.

“It’s a desperately sad read.”

As for what happened, Gordon said that although his friend was reluctant, Garson managed to convince him to join him on the night of August 15.

They drove around Hamilton before heading to Raglan around 11 p.m., with Garson at the wheel and smoking methamphetamine.

After stopping at Manu Bay, they headed to Te Toto Gorge.

Seeing McKinnon’s trailer, Garson’s friend convinced him to drive ahead and park.

Then they walked into the bush and smoked more cannabis and methamphetamine.

“You gave the gun to your friend and asked him to shoot you … he refused. [firearm] and I made an excuse to get back in the car and left you on the side of the road. “

Garson then returned to the gorge and began knocking on the door of the trailer.

Where to get help

If it is an emergency and you feel that you or someone else is at risk, call 111.

• Life line: 0800 543 354 (available 24/7)
• Suicide Crisis Helpline: 0508 828865 (0508 SUPPORT) (available 24/7)
• Youth Services: (06) 3555 906
• Youth line: 0800 376 633
• Kidsline: 0800 543 754 (available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week)
• What happens: 0800 942 8787 (1pm to 11pm)
• Helpline for depression: 0800111757 (available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week)
• Rainbow youth: (09) 376 4155
• CASPER suicide prevention