John McAfee is more than the founder of an antivirus maker-- now he is also a man on the run after the Belize police marked him as a "person of interest" in connection to the murder of a neighbour.
The victim, Gregory Faull, was an American expatriate who lived close to McAfee on the island of Ambergris Caye, Belize. According to the police, on 11 November Faull was found dead in a pool of blood on his hallway by his housekeeper. The cause of death? A gunshot wound on the back of his head.
At the murder scene authorities found a single expended shell from a 9mm Luger.
Following the murder (and the appearance of the police), McAfee decided to run for it-- even if he denies all involvement with the shooting. In an interview with Wired, McAfee tells a tale straight out of the movies, claiming he buried himself in the sand with a cardboard box over his head while the police searched through his properity.
“It was extraordinarily uncomfortable,” McAfee says. “But they will kill me if they find me... Under no circumstances am I going to willingly talk to the police in this country."
Reportedly Faull was at odds with McAfee. Then again so were all the others neighbours, who filed formal complaints about the barking from the 6 security dogs McAfee had at his beachside compound.
McAfee has been at odds with Belizean authorities for a while. Back in May 2012 the Belize Gang Suppression Unit raided his mainland property, accusing McAfee of possessing unlicensed weapons and manufacturing methamphetamine. The charges were dropped, but left McAfee paranoid, believing authorities want him out of the country
Reportedly, John McAfee left the US following legal woes-- in 2010 Fast Company suggested McAfee left Florida (after exaggerating his company's financial losses) in order to avoid fallout from a lawsuit surrounding the death of his nephew in a flying accident.
In an equally bizarre twist, back in 2010 McAfee used to post on Bluelight, a Russian-hosted druggie message board. Under the handle "stuffmonger" McAfee wrote about attempts to purify "bath salts" and adventures with "super perv powder," aka MPDV. A synthetic psychoactive drug, MPDV is banned in the US (and a number of European countries) but still legal in Belize.
What next for John McAfee? Currently he's still roaming his Belizean heart of darkness... at least until the police find him.