Man believed to be drowned shows up 5 years later

[cman]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,314661,00.html


wde

[Keith]

"Honey, I am just going to the store for a pack of cigarettes. Be back soon."

[skippy]

Originally Posted by Keith

"Honey, I am just going to the store for a pack of cigarettes. Be back soon."

Springsteen was singing about you in Hungry Heart???

[skippy]

Originally Posted by cman

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,314661,00.html

wde

UK police arrest 'amnesiac' canoeist

By THOMAS WAGNER, Associated Press Writer

Wed Dec 5, 10:23 AM ET

LONDON - British police arrested man on fraud charges Wednesday, five years after he vanished in an apparent canoeing accident in the North Sea — only to reappear last weekend, claiming he had amnesia.

The Daily Mirror tabloid, meanwhile, claimed that the man, 57-year-old John Darwin, and his wife, Anne, had been seen together in Panama since his disappearance and published what it said was a photo of them there.

The Daily Mirror and The Sun newspapers carried interviews with Anne Darwin, who moved recently to Panama, quoting her as saying she claimed her husband's life insurance benefits in good faith, believing he was dead.

Police Detective Superintendent Tony Hutchinson, leading an investigation in Cleveland, northern England, said police were trying to piece together where Darwin had been for the last five years and issued a public appeal for information on his whereabouts.

"There will be people out there who will know exactly where he has been, what he has been doing and where he has been living," Hutchinson said.

Detectives are considering the possibility of extraditing Anne Darwin, 55, from Panama to be questioned in Britain.

John Darwin had been working as a prison officer when he disappeared after going out into the North Sea in his canoe, which was later found wrecked on a beach. A coroner officially declared him dead.

But on Saturday, Darwin walked into a London police station, saying he had lost his memory.

The Sun quoted Anne Darwin as saying, the insurance benefits "were claimed in good faith when I believed I had lost my husband. ... Of course there is a possibility they may now have to be repaid. It is one of the many things I am struggling to come to terms with."

The Daily Mirror said its photo shows the Darwins in Panama last year when they stayed in an apartment rented through the firm Move to Panama. The newspaper ran a photo that it said was taken in July 2006, which appears to show them with the firm's boss Mario Vilar.

Vilar said they had not used the surname Darwin.

Anne Darwin was quoted by the Daily Mirror as saying that she received money from her husband's life insurance policies after he disappeared, but she denied that he faked his disappearance due to financial problems.

She was quoted as saying she had not seen him since he disappeared and that his reappearance last weekend was "the moment I've always prayed for."

"I'm as amazed as anyone else," she said before her husband's arrest.

Anne Darwin said her relatives were shocked when she moved to Panama City six weeks ago after selling the couple's home in Seaton Carew, 250 miles north of London.

She said she had spoken on the phone to her husband this week and planned to return to Britain to see him once she had resolved some visa problems and her furniture had been delivered from Britain.

If she were to face charges in the case, Britain has an extradition treaty with Panama, the Home Office said.

In England, Darwin's aunt, Margaret Burns, 80, told reporters the truth may be established "if we wait a bit."

"What's the point in speculating when we don't know? I'm as intrigued as anybody about what happens next," Burns said.

"Most of the family believe the trauma of nearly drowning in the canoe was enough to make him lose his memory, but I'm not so sure. I'm a cynic now. To be honest I don't believe he ever got his feet wet."
___

Associated Press correspondent Juan Zamorano contributed from Panama City.

[skippy]

Wife of 'back-from-dead' canoeist arrested on return to UK

Sun Dec 9, 12:06 PM

LONDON (AFP) - The wife of "back-from-the-dead" Briton John Darwin was arrested and taken for questioning after arriving back in Britain Sunday, police said, a day after her husband was charged over the alleged plot.

Anne Darwin was detained on her return from Panama, where she was tracked down after her husband walked into a London police station, claiming to remember nothing since vanishing in an apparent canoeing accident in 2002.

"Greater Manchester Police arrested a 55-year-old woman in connection with allegations of fraud as part of an investigation being headed by police in Cleveland," said a police spokeswoman.

She was detained on arrival at Manchester airport, and was due to be handed over to Cleveland Police who are leading the probe, the spokeswoman added.

A short time later she left the airport in a police vehicle and was driven to the police station near her home in Hartlepool, where she was expected to be questioned Monday.

Armed police boarded her plane after it landed from the United States to arrest her, according to the website of the Daily Mail, one of two newspapers which has had close access to her since she was found in Panama.

On Saturday John Darwin was charged with fraud: specifically "offences of obtaining a money transfer by deception and making an untrue statement... to procure a passport," a police spokesman said.

He is due to appear in court on Monday, and is expected to be remanded in custody for further questioning.

Darwin was presumed dead after disappearing in March 2002 near his home in Seaton Carew, north-eastern England.

But he reappeared last weekend, telling police officers that he could remember nothing of the last five years, and believed himself to be a missing person.

His wife was tracked down to Panama City and initially claimed shock at his reappearance, before being confronted with a photograph of the couple from last year which had emerged.

In comments to two British newspapers Saturday, Darwin's wife said she went along with his faked death to escape huge debts, and lived with him in secret for years.

"For three years, while virtually everyone close to us believed John was missing, presumed dead, he was actually at home with me," Anne Darwin said in the interview published in the Mail and Mirror tabloids.

"I know it seems too incredible to be true, but it is," she added.

Recounting how the extraordinary tale started, she said the couple had about 12 houses as rental investments and began to run up debts of tens of thousands of pounds.

Her husband told her faking his own death was the only way out -- and on March 22, 2002, he took his canoe out to sea and did not return, though the canoe washed up weeks later.

But she insisted she did not think his disappearance was fake, because they had not spoken about his plans for some time. "I really thought that he was dead," she said.

Then in February 2003, he returned, looking dishevelled.

He moved back in, hiding in the adjoining bedsit the couple owned when their grieving sons visited. When going outdoors he used a woolly hat, upturned collar, walking stick and limp to disguise himself.

He successfully applied for a passport in the name of John Jones.

At one point the couple travelled to Cyprus with a view to moving there, before turning to Panama City, where they bought an apartment for 97,000 dollars in April this year.

But when Darwin had to return to Britain as his visa was running out, he told his wife he was going to re-emerge and claim amnesia.

"I didn't think he would get away with it, but he had had enough of being dead," she said.

Darwin's aunt Margaret Burns, 80, said Saturday of the case: "It's beyond satire. You couldn't make it up."