The sordid tale of John McAffe’s flight from the Belizean police has had a little bit of everything. Poisoned dogs, automatic weapons, disgusting disguises, bath salts—to say nothing of the fake North Korean passport, benighted rants on political corruption Central America-style, even a lesson on the importance of wiping GPS data from your iPhone pics when on the lam. One thing it’s lacked: True Love.
Oh sure, Mr. McAfee has blogged on Belize’s bar-girl culture, and offered a seemingly honest accounting of his own relationships with young, impoverished women. (“Many have commented that these women were only with me because of my money – a fact that I have to agree with,” he blogged on November 19 title “Love and Deception.”)
Well, there’s nothing like a few weeks on the run to let romance blossom.
According to Vice editor-in-chief Rocco Castoro, one of the journalists who accidentally outed Mr. McAfee’s location when an underling neglected to wipe EXIF data off a photo of Mr. McAfee yesterday, the anti-virus pioneer is getting ready to marry Sam Vanegas, his 20-year-old girlfriend and traveling companion.
Per Mr. Castoro, Mr. McAfee had just finished a “delicious breakfast of crepes and fresh fruit juice,” when he hired hired a “powerful Guatemalan lawyer” named Telésforo Guerra, who happens to be Ms. Vanegas’s uncle, and made the following profession:
I have known Samantha for a year and a half. She is a remarkable young woman. I love her very much and we are getting married. Unfortunately you will have a potential criminal in the family. My apologies for that, and I will do the best I can to make it up to you.
Awwww? Though we can’t help but note when it comes to sweeping a 20-year-old woman off her feet and across international boundaries, it’s a slippery slope between true love and human trafficking.
