Antivirus creator John McAfee was found dead Wednesday in his Barcelona prison cell where he’d been awaiting extradition to the US since his arrest last October.
McAfee, 75, was about to board a plane to Turkey at El Prat airport when he was busted on tax-evading charges.
Tennessee authorities were suing the wealthy tech mogul for failing to report colossal incomes he made while providing services in promoting crypto-currencies and consulting.
Born in 1945 on an American Army Base in Britain, McAfee spent his early years in Virginia where he worked as a programmer and software designer.
He collaborated with several firms including NASA before starting to develop antivirus software.
He founded McAfee Associates before selling the computer antivirus company to Intel. In August 2009, his personal fortune was estimated as $4million.
“This man was a fighter,” his attorney Nishay Sanan said. “And in the minds of everyone who knew him, he will always be a fighter. This is again the US government trying to erase John McAfee. And that’s what it’s always going to be.”
In 2019, McAfee posted a disturbing tweet suggesting that if he was ever found dead, it was certainly not by suicide.
“Getting subtle messages from US officials saying, in effect: ‘We’re coming for you, McAfee! We’re going to kill yourself. I got a tattoo today just in case. If I suicide myself, I didn’t. I was whacked. Check my right arm.”
