Millionaire tech mogul John McAfee surfaced in Guatemala on Tuesday, after fleeing Belize last month where he was wanted for questioning in connection with the November murder of his neighbor.
The stranger-than-fiction story began on Nov. 11, when McAfee’s neighbor, American businessman Gregory Faull, 52, was found shot to death in his home.
The two neighbors quarreled often, particularly over McAfee’s four dogs. Faull complained constantly about their barking. Two days before Faull was killed, someone poisoned McAfee’s dogs and the tech mogul buried them on his property.
Although Belize authorities said McAfee, 67, wasn’t a suspect in the murder, McAfee decided not to take any chances. For the past month, with the help of the women in his life and a series of disguises, he has managed to evade Belize police efforts to bring him in for questioning.
One of the disguises involved McAfee altering his appearance to look like an elderly man with wrinkles and salt and pepper hair.
On Tuesday, McAfee re-emerged before the international media wearing a pin-striped suit, and with a woman in her 20s on his arm.
“I have been continually harassed by the government,” McAfee told reporters. “They’ve attempted to charge me with every crime ranging from running an antibiotics laboratory without a license to hiring security guards without a license, to having improper paperwork for my company and most recently the murder of my neighbor.”
McAfee claimed to Vice magazine that the Belize government would kill him if he returned for questioning. McAfee claims to have proof of government corruption in Belize.
In response to McAfee’s claims, on Wednesday the prime minister of Belize called the eccentric tech entrepreneur “extremely paranoid” and “bonkers.”
According to a Guatemalan government official, McAfee has yet to seek asylum in the country, but he told reporters he plans to remain there.
McAfee founded the American security software company McAfee Inc. in 1987, which he launched from his California home. In 1994 he sold his stake in the company, relocating to Belize in 2008.
According to a 2009 New York Times story, McAfee’s resulting $100 million fortune fell dramatically to about $4 million as the economic crisis impacted his real estate and stock investments.