Police seek Mcafee software founder

MEXICO CITY — Police in the Central American nation of Belize said Monday that they are looking for the founder of the software company McAfee Inc. to question him about the slaying of another U.S. citizen, his neighbour in an island town on the Caribbean.

John McAfee lived next door to 52-year-old Gregory Viant Faull, who was found with a gunshot wound to his head inside his twostorey home north of San Pedro, a town on the island of Ambergris Caye, said Raphael Martinez, spokesman for Belize’s Ministry of National Security. The housekeeper discovered the body Sunday morning and called police.

Martinez said that no charges had been filed in the case, describing McAfee, 67, only as a “person of interest” for police.

Police officers went to McAfee’s home on the island but he had not been there, the spokesman said.

The case was the latest twist in McAfee’s recent life as an eccentric yoga lover. He sold his stake in the anti-virus software company in the early 1990s and moved to Belize about three years ago to lower his taxes.

He told the New York Times in 2009 that he had lost all but $4 million of his $100 million (U.S.) fortune in the U.S. financial crisis and that he was moving to Belize.

Faull’s killing shocked the island community. Residents said Faull was a longtime homeowner there who had recently retired as a builder and moved from Florida to live full-time in the island.

“He was starting to enjoy his retirement,” said a real estate agent.

Martinez said police had questioned other neighbours of Faull but had been unable to locate McAfee. The AP tried unsuccessfully to contact McAfee by email. McAfee said in May that he was disconnecting his phone because he felt he was being harassed by police.