Software company founder John McAfee has surfaced in public for the first time in weeks, saying on Tuesday that he plans to ask for asylum in Guatemala because he fears persecution in Belize.
McAfee spoke to reporters at a restaurant near a high-end hotel where he is staying in Guatemala City after sneaking out of neighboring Belize. Police in Belize have called him a person of interest in last month’s slaying of a fellow US expatriate, but say there is no warrant for his arrest. Since there are no restrictions on his travels, it is unclear why he would need a special status to stay in Guatemala.
McAfee says he is being persecuted by the Belizean government and he has sensitive information about official corruption in that country. He has hired a well-known Guatemalan lawyer to assist him.
Photo: AFP
“I need a safe place where I can actually speak out,” McAfee said. “Now that I’m here I can speak freely. I can speak openly.”
Belizean police have denied they are persecuting McAfee or are motivated by corruption, saying they have simply been investigating a crime about which McAfee may have information.
Belizean Prime Minister Dean Barrow has expressed doubts about McAfee’s mental state, saying: “I don’t want to be unkind to the gentleman, but I believe he is extremely paranoid, even bonkers.”
McAfee told media that he will petition the Guatemalan government to allow him to stay. McAfee said he fears he will be killed if he turns himself in for questioning in Belize.
“Belize does not have a good track record of providing safety when they ask to question you,” he said.
McAfee is wanted for questioning in connection with the killing of Gregory Viant Faull, who was shot to death early last month on the Belize island where the men lived.
Faull’s home was a couple of houses down from the compound where McAfee kept several noisy dogs, armed guards and entertained a steady stream of young women from the mainland. McAfee acknowledges that his dogs were bothersome and that Faull had complained about them, but denied killing Faull. Several of the dogs were poisoned shortly before Faull’s killing.
“I am absolutely innocent,” McAfee said on Tuesday.
The Faull family has said through a representative that the murder of their loved one on Ambergris Caye has gotten lost in the media frenzy provoked by McAfee’s manipulation of the press through phone calls, e-mails and blog posts detailing his life on the run.
For two weeks, McAfee refused to turn himself in to authorities in Belize and claimed to be hiding in plain sight, wearing disguises and watching as police raided his house. However, it was unclear how much of what McAfee — a confessed practical joker — said and wrote was true.
On Monday, McAfee said he had fled from Belize using a bizarre ruse involving an elaborate distraction in neighboring Mexico.
In an e-mail to reporters, McAfee confirmed a posting to his Web site in which he described, in what appeared to be joking tones, how he mounted the ruse.
“My ‘double,’ carrying on [sic] a North Korean passport under my name, was detained in Mexico for pre-planned misbehavior, but due to indifference on the part of authorities [he] was evicted from the jail and was unable to serve his intended purpose in our exit plan,” McAfee wrote in the post.
In his comments to media on Tuesday, McAfee did not provide details of how he crossed from Belize into Guatemala.
McAfee had earlier said he did not plan to leave Belize, but ultimately did because he thought “Sam” was in danger, referring to the young woman who has accompanied him since he went into hiding.
McAfee, the creator of the McAfee antivirus program, has led an eccentric life since he sold his stake in the anti-virus software company that is named after him in the early 1990s and moved to Belize about three years ago to lower his taxes.
He told the New York Times in 2009 that he had lost all but US$4 million of his US$100 million fortune in the US financial crisis. However, a story on the Gizmodo Web site quoted him as calling that claim “not very accurate at all.”
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese