The wife of a British man who walked into a police station five years after disappearing admitted to knowing he was alive all along, in comments published yesterday.
Anne Darwin's remarks are the latest twist in an increasingly bizarre story that has seen her husband John, 57, arrested on suspicion of fraud, and a photograph published allegedly showing the couple last year in Panama, where she has since settled.
After being confronted about the photo, Anne Darwin, 55, conceded to the Daily Mail and Daily Mirror newspapers that "that picture answers a lot of questions."
"Yes, that's my husband," she said.
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She insisted that she had initially thought her husband had actually died after he disappeared after going canoeing in the North Sea in 2002, adding it was "quite some time" before she found out he was still alive.
Asked how long it was after his disappearance that she discovered he was alive, she would only say: "It was years later."
Darwin walked into a central London police station on Saturday and said he was a missing person.
He told police he could remember nothing of the last five years, and after what was described as an emotional reunion with his children was said to have no memory of anything since June 2000, two years before he went missing.
On Wednesday, he was arrested by police on suspicion of fraud, and arrived at northern England police station later that day to answer questions.
Police also confirmed that they had begun investigating his case three months ago after receiving "information to suggest that there was something suspicious with regard to his disappearance," of a "financial" nature.
Anne Darwin had earlier confirmed that she received life insurance payments in her husband's name, and said in yesterday's comments that she thought "these are the questions police will want to ask me now."
FRAUD
Asked whether she thought questioning over fraud was likely, she nodded.
On the subject of the police reopening their investigation into John, she said that he "has not been here all the time."
She added: "I will have to go back [to Britain] because I won't have any life here. My family will be absolutely devastated by all this. My sons knew nothing. They thought he was dead."
"They thought they had just got their dad back and now he's been whisked away. Now they are going to hate me," Anne Darwin said.
She continued: "I don't suppose the police will believe anything I tell them now. Yes, it looks pretty damning."
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