McAfee wants to ‘settle down to normal life’ in US

Software company founder John McAfee says he wants to return to the US and “settle down to whatever normal life” he can.

In a live-stream internet broadcast from the detention centre in Guatemala where he is fighting a government order that he be returned to Belize, the 67-year-old said: “I simply would like to live comfortably day by day, fish, swim, enjoy my declining years.”

Police in neighbouring Belize want to question McAfee in the fatal shooting of a US expatriate who lived near his home on a Belizean island in November.

The creator of the McAfee antivirus software again denied involvement in the killing during the video hook-up, during which he answered what he said were reporters’ questions. His comments were sometimes contradictory. McAfee is an acknowledged practical joker who has dabbled in yoga, ultra-light aircraft, and the production of herbal medications.

The British-born McAfee first said that returning to the US “is my only hope now”. But he later added, “I would be happy to go to England, I have dual citizenship.”

He was emphatic that “I cannot ever return to Belize... there is no hope for my life if I am ever returned to Belize.”

“If I am returned,” he said, “bad things will clearly happen to me”.

He described the health problems that had him briefly hospitalised last week after Guatemalan authorities detained him for entering the country illegally.

He apparently snuck in across a rural, unguarded spot along the border.

“I did not eat for two days, I drank very little liquids, and for the first time in many years I’ve been smoking almost non-stop,” he said.

“I stood up, passed out, hit my head on the wall, came to,” though he now said he was feeling better.

McAfee claims he is being persecuted by corrupt politicians. Authorities in Belize deny this they are persecuting him and have questioned his mental state.