John McAfee may go back to the United States again soon. The antivirus software pioneer, who spent years in Belize, Guatemala and Spain, was recently charged with tax evasion and willful failure to file tax returns.
According to an indictment on June 15, 2020, McAfee promoted cryptocurrencies, sold the rights to his life story for a documentary and did consulting work and speaking engagements. He was accused of failing to file tax returns from 2014 to 2018 despite earning more than $23,1 million from these sources and concealing assets in the names of others to evade the Internal Revenue Service.
In the indictment, McAfee is not accused of receiving any income or having any connection with McAfee Associates from 2014 to 2018. He founded the software company bearing his name in 1987 and ran it until 1994.
At the request of the U.S. Department of Justice, McAfee was arrested in an airport in Barcelona, Spain on October 3, 2020 when he was about to to board a flight to Istanbul, Turkey with a British passport. He was booked into the Centro penitenciario Brians 1 in Barcelona.
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Born in Cinderford, England, United Kingdom to an American father and a British mother on September 18, 1945, McAfee was raised in Salem, Virginia, USA. He earned bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Roanoke College in Salem in 1967 and worked as a programmer in the Institute for Space Studies of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in New York City, New York, USA from 1968 to 1970.
In February 2010, McAfee started QuorumEx, a company headquartered in Belize. The Gang Suppression Unit of the Belize Police Department raided his property in Orange Walk Town, Belize on April 30, 2012.
McAfee was arrested for unlicensed drug manufacturing and possession of an unlicensed weapon. He was released and was neither convicted nor charged.
On November 11, 2012, American expatriate Gregory Viant Faull was found dead of a gunshot wound at his home on the island of Ambergris Caye, the largest island in Belize. On November 12, 2012, Belize police started a search for McAfee as a person of interest in connection to the murder.
Faull and McAfee were neighbors. The latter fled Belize when he was sought for questioning concerning the murder of the former.
In 2012, it was revealed that McAfee was in Guatemala. He appeared publicly in Guatemala City and tried to seek political asylum, which was later on denied.
On December 5, 2012, McAfee was arrested for illegally entering Guatemala and was taken from his holding facility to a detention center in order to await deportation to Belize. On December 12, 2012, he was released from detention and was deported to the U.S.
McAfee’s experiences in Belize were the subject of the documentary titled “Gringo: The Dangerous Life of John McAfee,” which premiered on Showtime Networks in September 2016. On November 14, 2018, the Circuit Court in Orlando, Florida, USA refused to dismiss a wrongful death lawsuit against him for the murder of Faull in Belize.
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