[HN Gopher] John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court a...
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John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves
extradition to US
Author : ews
Score : 1148 points
Date : 2021-06-23 19:36 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.com)
| rozab wrote:
| Interview with Jena Friedman:
|
| https://youtu.be/tfe4Fjf3sds
| johneth wrote:
| I only wish it was longer.
| rozab wrote:
| Well lucky you! https://youtu.be/i0dhBGZgJnk
| drummer wrote:
| Awesome. The man had a wonderful sense of humor.
| andyxor wrote:
| McAffee didn't kill himself
| jszymborski wrote:
| From DeepL:
|
| > McAfee anti-virus founder John McAfee commits suicide in a
| Barcelona prison
|
| > The antivirus founder was arrested at El Prat airport and was
| awaiting extradition to the United States for tax evasion.
|
| > The founder of McAfee antivirus, John McAfee, has been found
| dead this afternoon in his cell in Brians 2 prison, in Sant
| Esteve de Sesrovires (Barcelona), according to police sources.
| The Mossos are investigating what happened, and everything points
| to a suicide, according to the Department of Justice. McAfee was
| pending extradition to the United States after being arrested by
| the National Police at El Prat airport.
|
| > McAfee, 75 years old, was being held in Module 1 of the Brians
| 1 penitentiary center. The prison guards, who found him dead in
| his cell, and the prison medical services intervened to perform
| resuscitation maneuvers, according to the Department of Justice,
| but were unable to save his life.
|
| > The controversial antivirus founder was arrested on October 3,
| 2020 at the airport of El Prat, when he was about to take a plane
| to Turkey. The arrest came at the request of the US justice
| system, which accuses McAfee of evading millions of dollars in
| taxes from profits allegedly obtained from activities such as
| cryptocurrency trading. The judge of the Audiencia Nacional Jose
| de la Mata ordered his imprisonment, and his extradition to the
| United States was already planned.
| ignoramous wrote:
| English translation by Google (via archive.is):
| https://archive.is/pxc4H
| prvc wrote:
| Is there currently any information out there as to the cause of
| his death?
| shimonabi wrote:
| I once actually paid real money to read a short story about his
| adventures in Belize.
|
| He had a good run.
| [deleted]
| stevespang wrote:
| Wow, like Aaron Swartz, McAfee gave his "final middle finger" to
| the US Gov't. - - now he is a martyr.
| dang wrote:
| We changed the URL from
| https://elpais.com/economia/2021-06-23/el-fundador-del-antiv...
| to the most neutral English-language article that was easy to
| Google.
| yarcob wrote:
| The new URL is not available from EU
| mellosouls wrote:
| Not available to European readers.
|
| Alternative examples here:
|
| https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-57589822
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jun/23/john-mcafee-...
| dang wrote:
| Thanks to you both for letting me know. Let's go with the BBC
| link for now. (URL changed from
| https://www.nbc4i.com/news/u-s-world/john-mcafee-found-
| dead-...)
| mc32 wrote:
| Good or bad, what a sad ending to a colorful life.
|
| The guy was troubled and had many shortcomings, but he was
| colorful and also achieved success and arguably was one of the
| seminal figures in the nascent AV industry.
|
| Sad to see his fall from grace and into a world of extravagance,
| deceit and cheating (taxes) and, if allegations true, even worse;
| then to end it on the floor of a jail -all by his own hands.
| smoldesu wrote:
| John McAfee is to Terry Davis what Jim Carry is to Adam Sandler
| dang wrote:
| Please don't do this here.
| gkoberger wrote:
| I mean, he very likely killed his neighbor in 2012... so I feel
| like "colorful" undermines how much of a monster he's been for
| over a decade.
| cpursley wrote:
| Why did he kill his neighbor?
| MauranKilom wrote:
| According to news story: McAffee's dogs kept terrorizing
| people on the beach, neighbor poisoned dogs, McAffee hired
| hitman to torture and kill neighbor.
| mc32 wrote:
| There were some very disturbing allegations against him
| --which is why I included his fall from grace and the good or
| bad.
|
| I would just add some skepticism to the charges only because
| the police down there can be corrupt and or inept and subject
| to bribery and so on. I don't know if there has been an
| independent international inquiry into the matter.
|
| Anyway, I think it's sad to see people when they throw away
| all the earned achievements in such a debauched way.
| seppin wrote:
| The good: creating anti-virus software that crashed your
| work machine once a day.
|
| The bad: murder and rape.
|
| I don't think those things even remotely cancel each other
| out.
| mrtksn wrote:
| If you are rich enough you are eccentric and colorful.
| heliodor wrote:
| Money enables what's already there.
| jl6 wrote:
| In pecunia veritas.
| teach wrote:
| "He's mad?" "Sort of mad. But mad with lots of money." "Ah,
| then he can't be mad. I've been around; if a man has lots
| of money he's just eccentric."
|
| -- Terry Pratchett, The Light Fantastic
| mrosett wrote:
| The obvious point you're making is about a double standard
| -- rich people are unfairly given more slack than others.
| But an alternative framing amounts to evaluating a method
| by its results -- basically saying "I don't know why you're
| behaving that way, but for reasons I don't understand it
| seems to work for you." That obviously falls apart if you
| can cleanly separate their wealth/financial success from
| their behavior e.g. because they inherited the money.
| [deleted]
| mrtksn wrote:
| I was actually referring to the slack given to him for
| apparent murder and putting the police force on a
| payroll.
|
| "killing your neighbor, bribing the police and never
| serving a single day for it? What an eccentric person you
| are"
| vmception wrote:
| The slack has a compounding effect
|
| Like, sure public perception isn't immediately bad when
| someone is perceived as wealthy
|
| But the immediate and long term consequences are very
| different whether people went along with it or not
|
| People can have louder and wilder public opinions when
| they aren't beholden to current/future employment or even
| advertising dollars
|
| Even convicted people that do not need employment are
| able to just go back to whatever they were doing. They
| are not marginalized.
|
| Even before conviction they can pay fines and settlements
| and make it orders of magnitude more expensive for
| prosecution to even mount a case
| prvc wrote:
| You're saying "likely" as a hedge, when in fact you are
| instead merely expressing an opinion, without any knowledge
| of the actual numerical likelihood of such an event having
| happened.
| Tenoke wrote:
| What numerical value? He either did it or didn't. Likely is
| an expression on the subjective probability based on the
| information they have.
| bdamm wrote:
| What subjective probability is at play? None of us were
| there, or even in court. Maybe something very traumatic
| to Mr. McAfee happened that day. Would that inform some
| of his later recklessness?
| Tenoke wrote:
| I roll a dice ask you to guess if it landed on 4 while
| telling you it didn't land on 5. Your subjective
| probability of it being 4 is 20% even if you weren't
| there when I rolled it.
| prvc wrote:
| What is the value of the poster's feelings about this,
| when we can rely on actual information instead? Appending
| "likely" to the statement is just a way to dress up a
| baseless opinion in the garb of objectivity.
| brainfog wrote:
| The amount of pedantry and over the top literalism in your
| comment gave me an aneurism.
| tptacek wrote:
| But it didn't _really_ give you an aneurysm, _did it???_.
| skidnews wrote:
| Knowing the "actual" numerical likelihood is not necessary
| to deem something "likely" or not.
|
| I will likely take a shit tomorrow, but cannot say so with
| certainty and lack the "actual numerical likelihood."
|
| MacAfee fled the country after his neighbor was shot, and
| was wanted by police for questioning. Let's not get cute
| with metaphysical discussions about hedging bets and
| "actual numerical likehoods" lol.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| 51%
| steego wrote:
| I believe that's how most people in society invoke a
| numerically void word like the word "likely".
|
| Call my cynical, but time and experience has taught me that
| people do not back up qualifying words with the appropriate
| level of mathematical rigor.
|
| It's as if they want to express an opinion without doing
| the leg work or providing any citations.
|
| Had he invested the time to calculate an estimate of
| likelihood, I'm willing to bet an estimate or confidence
| interval would have been parenthetically inserted into his
| remarks.
|
| That's what my experience tells me. YMMV
| BitwiseFool wrote:
| "people do not back up qualifying words with the
| appropriate level of mathematical rigor."
|
| To be fair, how in the world am I supposed to calculate
| such things and provide a satisfactory number?
|
| The vast majority of my conversations and discourse don't
| require or benefit from giving a range or specific value
| to such words. Would the preceding sentence be better if
| I said 90%, 95%, 99.5% instead of 'vast majority'? And to
| be honest, most people - especially myself - aren't at
| all accurate with probability estimates, let alone
| calculations.
| X6S1x6Okd1st wrote:
| Would you have preferred the poster express a specific
| probability that they hold their belief at?
| jb775 wrote:
| Guilty until proven innocent?
| txsoftwaredev wrote:
| And if the ladies stories about his hammock usage is true...
| joering2 wrote:
| [I stand corrected]
| ceejayoz wrote:
| It hasn't been "John's software" since 1994.
| boomboomsubban wrote:
| So people don't have to look that up, some women claimed he
| liked seemingly consensual scat. Not really comparable to
| alleged murder.
| kingsuper20 wrote:
| lol. I had to look that up.
|
| Maybe he hung out with Chuck Berry too much.
| prvc wrote:
| That makes him a monster?
| [deleted]
| bennyp101 wrote:
| I mean, is that 100% true?
| dnh44 wrote:
| If I remember the story correctly the neighbour killed his
| dogs. That's a pretty strong motive.
| Vadoff wrote:
| John Wick agrees
| Razengan wrote:
| Sounds like someone else with the same first name and
| motive.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Actually, John killed his own dogs after he believed they
| were poisoned by his neighbor. Were they really poisoned,
| or was that just one of his psychotic delusions(like his
| claim that Belizean officials were out to kill him but
| killed Faull by mistake)?
|
| We'll never know. But we do know that his dogs were
| allowed to run free in a giant pack and attacked at least
| 6 people (probably more, but they may be locals and not
| ex-pats/tourists whose claims are more likely to be
| reported on)
| cwkoss wrote:
| He claimed that he gifted laptops to the Belizean
| government pre-loaded with spyware and alleged to have
| found evidence that multiple top officials were engaged
| in drug and human trafficking.
|
| If true, would certainly be a motive for those officials.
| FullyFunctional wrote:
| This is how conspiracies are created. There's no evidence
| and strong motive for him to create this conspiracy.
|
| I'm a big fan of Occam's razor and in this case the
| simplest explanation, in light of _evidence_ of which
| there was plenty in the documentary, is that he was not
| truthful.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Weird he never provided any proof of his claims about
| that. You would think that if he was invested enough to
| put his own life in risk(according to him) to find out
| the extent of corruption among officials in Belize, that
| he would, perhaps, release the information in some manner
| instead of just pretending like it never existed.
|
| And what was the thinking of the officials who allegedly
| received the laptops? "Oh no, the man who gave us free
| laptops has been reading everything we've done on these
| laptops. Let's plan his murder on these laptops now.
| Don't worry about finding his address, it's just some
| home north of San Pedro right? Just go kill a guy and it
| must be John"
| swader999 wrote:
| He mentioned in his tweets a lot will be released upon
| his death. We'll see I guess.
| ozten wrote:
| Even without being found guilty of murder... if you watch
| that documentary he hires very unsavory characters to be
| his armed guards 24x7.
|
| You are one of the richest people on the planet and you
| choose to be an armed bully on a small island with a lot of
| poverty to exploit.
|
| He could literally have any lifestyle he wanted.
| fastball wrote:
| He hadn't been one of the richest people on the planet in
| more than a decade.
|
| Definitely did not have enough money for literally any
| lifestyle, especially seeing as it appears he owed a lot
| of money in back taxes.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| Probably (by which I refer to the standard of judgement in
| the civil suit). https://www.theregister.com/2019/03/20/mca
| fee_25m_lawsuit_ne...
| bennyp101 wrote:
| Ok.
|
| _hand wavey_ Tasered is not torture, else surely cops
| wouldn 't use it? And he poisoned 4 dogs, people get
| rather angry about their pets. But yea, killing over it
| is extreme.
|
| Still, seems an odd thing to extradite him for. Maybe
| more to the story which we will never know.
| spacechild1 wrote:
| > Tasered is not torture, else surely cops wouldn't use
| it?
|
| You know, a cop would taser you once for a few seconds.
| That poor guy got tasered repeatedly, including his
| genitalia. How is this not torture?
| Miner49er wrote:
| > You know, a cop would taser you once for a few seconds.
|
| Most of the time. Cops are known to torture people with
| tasers in the US by using them for long periods of time
| or repeatedly.
| panopticon wrote:
| And on the genitalia too. There was that Chicago police
| squad that tortured suspects with a cattle prod to the
| testicles to coerce confessions.
| cbsmith wrote:
| > Tasered is not torture, else surely cops wouldn't use
| it?
|
| You see a lot of Taser marks on people's genitals?
|
| Cops have used clubs for years, that doesn't mean you
| can't torture someone with a club.
| [deleted]
| ska wrote:
| > Tasered is not torture, else surely cops wouldn't use
| it?
|
| The history of trying to define things like "torture" as
| what the "good guys" don't do has a long an storied past,
| none of it successful.
| seppin wrote:
| And a long history of probable sexual assault / rape.
| luhego wrote:
| Even though he lived a cuestionable life. He was a free man until
| the end. I respect him for that.
| eganist wrote:
| Technically still a free man. No convictions against him as
| related to the extradition request.
| msbarnett wrote:
| > He was a free man until the end.
|
| He literally died in jail.
| mc32 wrote:
| Jail is detention before trial, not imprisonment in a
| penitentiary.
| ornornor wrote:
| Isn't the end result the same: you can't go anywhere? I
| wouldn't call that free.
| msbarnett wrote:
| I wouldn't describe being held in custody pending
| extradition as "being free". YMMV.
| mc32 wrote:
| Yes and no. It's not like I'd expect him to carry a
| cyanide pill and just as he's about to be arrested
| swallows it to be technically correct.
|
| I think this qualifies "dying free" in spirit since his
| death means objection to remaining in custody.
| moate wrote:
| Just to be clear: We're saying it's admirable to kill
| yourself rather than face the consequences of your
| illegal behavior? That's what we're respecting in this
| thread?
|
| The man was believed to have committed a litany of
| offenses including attacking other humans but "he was so
| respectable because he never let them convict him"?
|
| "Bad rich guy kills himself in pathetic attempt to avoid
| justice" would be my preferred headline personally.
| DJBunnies wrote:
| It is still being held captive against ones will.
| pm90 wrote:
| Either way it's questionable if he was "free".
| luhego wrote:
| He lived his life the way he wanted and he even decided how
| to die.
| casi18 wrote:
| its interesting to read reflections of people locked up. very
| often they talk of how we are all in our own forms of jail.
| freedom is a state of mind.
| anonytrary wrote:
| Hold on. I talk like this and I'm a free man with a good
| job, good friends, and a good life. Sure, it becomes even
| more apparent when you are in a cage. But it's true,
| everyone really is in a cage of their own making. Even
| worse, being in a cage of someone else's making.
| res0nat0r wrote:
| Everyone seems to forget that he likely had his neighbor
| tortured and killed:
| https://www.theregister.com/2019/03/20/mcafee_25m_lawsuit_ne...
| morelisp wrote:
| He also raped a business partner.
| haakon wrote:
| He's so frequently called "colorful" and "successful". In
| fact, he was a nutjob who most likely did unspeakable things
| when he wasn't busy doing just terrible things.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Charisma is a helluva drug.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| so is MDPV.
|
| John was "stuffmonger" on a drug forum here:
| https://www.bluelight.org/xf/threads/hello-and-an-mdpv-
| quest...
|
| A good summary here: https://www.reddit.com/r/JoeRogan/co
| mments/8utitu/john_mcafe...
| enriquto wrote:
| Funniest stuff I've read in years. Lit up my mood a bit
| after the bad news.
| vernie wrote:
| This is a community built around aspiring to be a rich
| freak, what do you expect?
| ryanmentor wrote:
| Though they caged his body, his soul was unchained.
| tromp wrote:
| Or in english:
|
| https://nypost.com/2021/06/23/john-mcafee-dies-by-suicide-in...
| adrianmonk wrote:
| Another English source:
|
| https://news.yahoo.com/john-mcafee-found-dead-spanish-193256...
| eganist wrote:
| https://elpais-com.translate.goog/economia/2021-06-23/el-fun...
|
| Google translate.
| neom wrote:
| I met John in an Atlanta airport lounge years ago[1]. I
| recognized him immediately as I've always admired him, and I
| decided to go up to him and tell him as much. He invited me to
| sit down, and told him about when I was a teenager in the 90s
| learning about tech entrepreneurs at the time, I always thought
| he was pretty cool and had good ideas. I told him I respected
| him, and that I was sure he'd lived an incredible life and
| thanked him for his contributions. He was clearly totally
| sloshed(inebriated) and insisted he called his wife so I could
| recount the story to her. I did. An hr later I had to leave to
| catch my flight, and i asked him where he was going - he said I'd
| find out some "pretty crazy shit" about him next week, and that
| "the doc was a bunch of BS". Two days later, I read Show Time had
| announced "Gringo: The Dangerous Life of John McAfee". In the
| brief time I spent with him, I have to say he had pretty positive
| energy for someone who was portrayed the way he was.
|
| [1] https://share.getcloudapp.com/p9uAN0jQ
| duxup wrote:
| It's unfortunate that a lot of things we like about people,
| doesn't really go hand in hand for making good choices
| otherwise.
| api wrote:
| He clearly lost his mind at some point. Late John McAfee !=
| early John McAfee. Heavy drug abuse and alcoholism looks to
| have played a role.
|
| Giving tons of money to a chronic addict (like he got when he
| cashed out of his company) can be a death sentence.
| jmcgough wrote:
| Sometimes drug abuse and alcoholism is just an outcome of
| other problems. I wouldn't be shocked to hear that he had
| untreated bipolar or something.
| njoubert wrote:
| Do you have any experience with the stuff you're making such
| bold statements about, because I have; and my god did you
| oversimplify things.
| threatofrain wrote:
| Then perhaps you can provide some clarity rather than
| alluding to hidden knowledge that you won't show people?
| Otherwise what the public has to go on would be John
| McAfee's YT and Twitter.
| shapefrog wrote:
| Tons of money, check Tons of blow, check
|
| It was pretty simple at the time, blow up the nose, money
| to the hooker, repeat and rinse. It only got complicated
| when I ran out of money.
| cwkoss wrote:
| I don't think he lost his mind, but rather decided that it
| was more fun to seek attention than credibility.
| jbverschoor wrote:
| Exactly.. the art of not giving a fuck
| lavela wrote:
| Seeking attention is an opposite of not giving a fuck.
| ahartmetz wrote:
| I think not giving a fuck means not caring to appear
| respectable in this context.
| jonahss wrote:
| watch his self-filmed youtube channel and you may change
| your mind
| rchaud wrote:
| Mostly towards the end of his life it would appear. I don't
| recall hearing anything about him prior to 2016 and the
| run-up in crypto.
| mypalmike wrote:
| He routinely popped up in the news over the last 20 years
| at least.
| JohnMcafee wrote:
| I remember taking that pic.
| Buttons840 wrote:
| When you say he was "sloshed" do you mean he was drunk? Or do
| you mean he was very pleased with your praise?
| diogenesjunior wrote:
| bruh: https://i.imgur.com/4Jw7EyE.png
| afterburner wrote:
| Sloshed means drunk.
| arthurcolle wrote:
| the former
| jiofih wrote:
| Not sure why you're downvoted. I was also confused for a
| moment - "inebriated with praise" is not an uncommon
| expression.
| hluska wrote:
| Sloshed is a weird word. It means drunk but if you go through
| etymology, it started at slush and moved to slosh which was
| to splash around in slush. Then somewhere along the lines,
| 'slosh' meant to pour without care and make a mess. That
| turned into pour alcohol carelessly and become a mess.
| Arnavion wrote:
| I always thought the association was directly from
| "splashing around", as in "you're so drunk that it's like
| you've been swimming in the stuff."
| neom wrote:
| Where I grew up in Scotland, sloshed very specifically
| meant you couldn't pour the booze straight anymore, more
| than just a bit drunk. However, it's also considered
| somewhat polite, I thought... more appropriate when
| speaking of the dead.
| jwdunne wrote:
| That's the meaning in Manchester too. Extreme state of
| intoxication by alcohol. Beyond mere "I'm drunk".
| heyoni wrote:
| The latter
| newsclues wrote:
| Sloppy drunk was the impression I had.
| rcurry wrote:
| The sad thing is that our government seems to make a point of
| screwing with kooks. I don't care if McAffee owed some taxes -
| leave the guy alone, he's obviously unstable, has major
| problems with drug and alcohol addiction and all they can do is
| try to bring him even lower. Poor guy had major problems even
| before the "heroes" of the FBI or the IRS or whatever started
| screwing with him. Let the poor guy ride off into the sunset
| for Pete's sake.
| octopoc wrote:
| Reminds me of the movie American Hustle. The government has a
| choice of going after criminals who badly hurt a lot of
| people or going after the easily-demonized bit players. Guess
| which is good for their careers.
| Klinky wrote:
| The dude was found liable for two people's deaths, and evaded
| taxes, like... I dunno. He doesn't seem like that great of a
| guy. He seems like a self-centered reckless narcissist
| leaving destruction in his wake.
| hellbannedguy wrote:
| When was he found guilty for the dead neighbor?
|
| Anyways---you don't poison a guy's dogs.
|
| (Yea--I know, I'm suspose to be compassionate over rich
| dead guys. By rich dead guys, I mean the neighbor who was
| constantly complaining over John's dogs whom was found
| dead. As far as today, they had no evidence against John.)
|
| I liked John. I liked he was different than most rich guys.
| I painfully remember him stating he doesn't pay taxes. I
| remember wishing he didn't say that in a documentary.
| tclancy wrote:
| Well sure.
|
| But do it for poor people first. There are a million people
| without millions suffering from similar treatment in the US.
| rcurry wrote:
| Thank you for taking the time to reply, I appreciate it. I
| also agree with you. What I'm emphasizing is that our
| government prefers to go after weak targets.
|
| Not sure why you are being downvoted, you make a good
| point.
| gizdan wrote:
| > I don't care if McAffee owed some taxes - leave the guy
| alone, he's obviously unstable
|
| This is ridiculous. Okay so let's leave all the rich people
| alone who claim they are unstable. McAfee made millions, from
| what I understand, he paid little taxes on that. That's
| stupid. I don't care how unstable you are, or how good you
| are donating your "fair share". You're still not excused from
| paying your taxes.
| to1y wrote:
| Parent poster meant let's not make him look like a loon and
| hound him relentlessly because of it.
| gizdan wrote:
| As use hugi said, that's exactly what he was, so why
| shouldn't we?
| hugi wrote:
| But he was a loon and a thief/tax cheat
| ab737 wrote:
| So is Bezos, Musk, Zuckerberg, etc
| rcurry wrote:
| Exactly. Thank you.
| auggierose wrote:
| I guess Google, Facebook and Apple are stupid then too.
| gizdan wrote:
| Yes. Yes, they absolutely are, and they should be
| prosecuted for their tax avoidance. Same with Amazon and
| all other companies. I, as lone individual tax payer,
| paid _more_ in taxes in the UK than Amazon, Facebook,
| Google, and Apple did, probably combined. That is not
| okay.
|
| Edit: evasion > avoidance.
| joejerryronnie wrote:
| There is a big difference between illegal tax evasion and
| leveraging existing tax code to reduce your taxes as much
| as possible.
| gizdan wrote:
| I edited my comment. I meant tax avoidance.
|
| I totally understand that there is legal means of
| essentially not paying taxes. That still does not make it
| okay. As I mentioned, I, as a lone tax payer, who made
| less then PS100k, paid more in taxes in FAANG combined in
| the UK. That FAANG, who made billions. I probably paid
| more in the UK than FAANG paid in federal taxes (in the
| US) combined. The fact that Bezos was able to claim tax
| refunds despite him literally being _the_ richest person
| in the world and to hear /read people defending him
| because "he legally did so" is absolutely mind boggling.
| [deleted]
| aplummer wrote:
| There is a massive difference between following poorly
| written laws correctly and breaking the law.
| ezekg wrote:
| Yes -- one writes the laws, the other disregards them.
| aplummer wrote:
| Huh? The government writes the laws, the people elect
| them. These laws could say "95% maximum tax bracket"
| (They used to) but they don't. There could be a CEO tax,
| but there isn't.
| jmcgough wrote:
| I mean he certainly could afford some good CPAs to
| mitigate his tax burden if he wanted to.
| [deleted]
| Bancakes wrote:
| Bezos and McAffee paid about the same amount of taxes.
| slg wrote:
| That isn't relevant for two reasons:
|
| 1. Tax evasion and tax avoidance are not the same thing.
|
| 2. Most people who think McAffee didn't pay enough taxes
| probably also believe Bezos doesn't pay enough taxes.
| Bancakes wrote:
| Tax avoidance is tax evasion in all ways but legal.
| ab737 wrote:
| Now do Bezos, Musk, Zuckerberg...
| bilbo0s wrote:
| To be fair, you can't really do that because then that lowly
| waitress who owes, say, 3 grand because her manager reported
| her tips will say, "Why do rich people get off?"
|
| And she'd be right.
|
| If you go after anyone, you have to go after everyone in my
| view. If anything, you should go soft on the low income
| people rather than the wealthy. But on the federal level,
| going soft on a famous and wealthy person when you have the
| exact same evidence is just not something you can do in a
| rule of law society. Particularly in today's environment. You
| can do that on a state and local level, but on a federal
| level the IRS, FBI and the prosecutors would be crucified.
| jeofken wrote:
| Correct. These systems can not work the moment the armed
| men from the government stop threatening with guns. If
| ethics are universal, such immorality as we wouldn't accept
| from a family or a democratic HOA, can such behaviour be
| acceptable from any other group, larger or smaller.
| jasonl99 wrote:
| "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the
| unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to
| himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable
| man."
|
| -- George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman
|
| I've always used this as an excuse for what might be
| considered being weird (at least that's what my family tells
| me).
| rcurry wrote:
| As Hunter Thompson would say, when the going gets weird the
| weird turn pro.
| stevespang wrote:
| Gotta luv Hunter, McAfee was on Hunter's level . . . .
| Scoundreller wrote:
| Your sketchy looking link which I mistakenly clicked on instead
| of copy and pasting into my VM is b0rk. Says "This item has
| exceeded its view limit!"
| llacb47 wrote:
| works for me
| IntrepidWorm wrote:
| Rebuilt that link for ya, friend. Cheers!
|
| http://www.5z8.info/racist-message-board_u1s1lj_-----
| TAKE.TW...
| quenix wrote:
| You run a VM just to inspect "sketchy-looking links"? That
| sounds like paranoid behavior, if I'm being honest.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| If anything, not paranoid enough because still tracking.
|
| This place would be one of the best to hit with a 0day.
| Lots of IT people with full admin rights to entire
| corporate networks.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| Windows 10 pro let's you bring up fresh sandbox with one
| click and about 5 seconds to boot, it's really not such a
| burden.
|
| Or maybe people just have temp VMs running anyway, and like
| others have said, if you're browsing hacker news on your
| work machine you should probably do so with a healthy dose
| of paranoia.
| CWuestefeld wrote:
| This is a thread about John McAfee, after all.
| bena wrote:
| A healthy paranoia if you grew up with the internet.
|
| When a link can compromise an entire machine, having a
| machine you can literally throw away with no consequence is
| nice.
|
| Hell, I'd wager to say that containers wouldn't be a thing
| if it weren't for this kind of behavior. Looking for ways
| to build up and destroy VMs even faster.
| dwarfsandstuff wrote:
| You need a faster computer, man!
| toss1 wrote:
| My interaction with McAfee was in the pre-internet '80s. I was
| called when a nearby international school got hit by a computer
| virus spread on floppy disks. Looking for sources of info,
| found the "Computer Virus Industry Association". Called, got a
| little bit of generic advice, and he mostly asked me to send
| sample disks. Turned out that the "CVIA" was basically a
| pretext of McAfee trolling for people like me to send samples
| for the anti-virus software he was writing.
|
| Sure, mildly clever ruse, but I always felt that the way it was
| done was a bit off - could have been more straightforward. I
| guess he thought people would not help him if he didn't use the
| pretext.
|
| Somehow the rest of the story does not surprise me. Making his
| millions seems to have given him no peace either.
|
| RIP
| onemoresoop wrote:
| I'd argue that making those millions turned his life upside
| down, made his life drown in hedonism, eventually taking his
| mind and any shred of dignity. Still, RIP John
| inovica wrote:
| Often meeting your hero's does not go well, so pleased this did
| for you :)
| shon wrote:
| It may seem odd to some, but I think the world was better off
| with McAffee alive. I doubt he took his own life. He seems to be
| the sort of fellow who would in some way enjoy going to court,
| even if only to have his point of view heard.
| dccoolgai wrote:
| Didn't he always say he had a bunch of "dirt" that was triggered
| to release on a coffin switch? Guess we'll find out soon.
| aix1 wrote:
| There is a documentary about his time in Belize:
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/nov/18/gringo-dangerou...
| chaganated wrote:
| big F for my man john mcafee. epsteined in his prime. he will be
| missed.
| mooseburger wrote:
| Getting Epstein "suicide" vibes from this.
| xedeon wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27609146
| bethecloud wrote:
| From McAffee in 2019, "Getting subtle messages from U.S.
| 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 whackd. Check my right arm. "
|
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/120086428376625152...
| throwkeep wrote:
| October, 2020
|
| I am content in here. I have friends.
|
| The food is good. All is well.
|
| Know that if I hang myself, a la Epstein, it will be no fault
| of mine.
|
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/131680121508322509...
| ceejayoz wrote:
| April, 2021
|
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/138634987054662041.
| ..
|
| > I have been imprisoned in Catalonia nearly 7 months. I
| speak no Catalan and little Spanish so human contact is
| limited. There are no entertainments - no escape from
| loneliness, from emptiness, from myself.
|
| > This has been the most trying period of my life.
|
| Turns out prison sucks after a while.
|
| As for the food, he changed his tune on that, too:
|
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/139145553961222553.
| ..
|
| > Most prison food in Spain is indistinguishable from rat
| shit in motor oil. The single exception is potato pie, which
| is only served on Saturdays.
|
| > Unfortunately today is Sunday.
| ska wrote:
| > Turns out prison sucks after a while.
|
| Sounds like it sucks at the beginning, too.
| ibejoeb wrote:
| Yeah, and also he was a pretty damn good troll. No doubt he
| had a backup plan, and this was probably it.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| He said he'd eat his dick on live TV if Bitcoin didn't hit
| $500k by last year
| (https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/887012614131372032,
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/887039604846714881,
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/887024683379544065)
| so the track record on predictions... isn't great.
| knicholes wrote:
| At least he doesn't have to fulfill that promise, albeit
| late.
| aazaa wrote:
| He never made good on this promise:
|
| https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7qawy/john-mcafee-no-longer...
|
| Kind of undermines his credibility.
| shon wrote:
| ;D
| jbverschoor wrote:
| Tweet from last week:
|
| "My friends evaporated through fear of association.
|
| I have nothing.
|
| Yet, I regret nothing."
| 867-5309 wrote:
| a great quote -- thanks for this
| greyface- wrote:
| Link to said tweet: https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status
| /140517850671217459...
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| McAfee is an interesting person but I believe absolutely
| nothing that he says.
| rmason wrote:
| In his last prison interview he said that all his money was
| gone, his friends had all abandoned him and yet he regretted
| nothing. Sure sounds like a last statement to me.
| JohnMcafee wrote:
| $WHACKD
| VOSgqcSyGdPhGWP wrote:
| And in late 2020: "I am content in here. I have friends. The
| food is good. All is well. Know that if I hang myself, a la
| Epstein, it will be no fault of mine."
|
| https://archive.ph/peexn
| [deleted]
| jahewson wrote:
| What you have here is someone ruminating on and obsessing over
| themes of suicide. Sadly that's exactly the kind of person who
| goes on to fall victim to that behaviour.
| okamiueru wrote:
| As cynical as it might seem, there is an alternative
| possibility: in spite of getting a tattoo saying he would not
| kill himself, and in spite of posting a tweet saying he would
| not kill himself, he went ahead and killed himself.
| willis936 wrote:
| An unstable personality that hates the US saying the US
| government would stage a suicide is much more likely to
| actually kill themselves than your regular run-of-the-mill
| evil billionaire with powerful enemies saying nothing about
| how they will die.
|
| I don't think Mcafee really thought things through enough to
| come to this conclusion.
| madememakeacct wrote:
| "I'd never kill myself" is exactly what a suicidal person
| _would_ say.. Great post.
| willis936 wrote:
| They even had it tattoo'd on their arm in a cringey
| fashion to show how down-to-Earth and committed to this
| plane of existence they were.
| meepmorp wrote:
| That's like 300% sane!
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > As cynical as it might seem, there is an alternative
| possibility: in spite of getting a tattoo saying he would not
| kill himself, and in spite of posting a tweet saying he would
| not kill himself, he went ahead and killed himself
|
| In fact, if you have people who will believe you (either
| becuase of who you are or who your target is), and a beef
| against someone, and see a confluence of circumstances likely
| to lead to a place where suicide is your only way out, why
| _wouldn't_ you set them up to take the blame if it got to
| that point (especially if you blamed them for the situation
| driving in that direction, so you might feel that it was a
| lie in only peripheral details, but not grand narrative.)
| read_if_gay_ wrote:
| That would have been a _very_ long con since he has been
| tweeting things like this since 2019.
| cwyers wrote:
| Well, seeing as 2019 is when he fled the US to avoid
| prosecution for tax fraud, it's not like it took a lot of
| foresight to say "hrm, maybe the US government will catch
| me."
| read_if_gay_ wrote:
| Still that's quite petty motivation for such a long con.
| cwyers wrote:
| How is this a long con? It's two years. According to the
| indictments he was being extradited for, that's _not the
| longest con John McAfee has been involved in_.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| "Such a long con" kind of assumes that McAfee thought if
| he got caught, it would take this long.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > That would have been a very long con since he has been
| tweeting things like this since 2019.
|
| He started doing that not long after (or maybe
| concurrently with) announcing he was on the run from the
| USG in relation to the specific charges that he was
| ordered to be extradited to immediately before actually
| committing suicide.
| smsm42 wrote:
| Which poses the question - if you're absolutely sure you're
| not going to kill yourself, how could you make sure that
| everybody knows it and believes it? Is there a way?
| willis936 wrote:
| Reliable (and potentially even publicly accessible)
| surveillance. Just livestream every moment of your life and
| keep logs in multiple locations.
| prometheus76 wrote:
| How does that work if you are in prison?
| willis936 wrote:
| You can't. That's the job of the prison. This is why
| people get upset when there is a "CCTV malfunction" when
| high profile prisoners supposedly kill themselves.
| [deleted]
| lrae wrote:
| Not an option though if you're jailed in Barcelona.
| smsm42 wrote:
| Well, unless you get taken to prison where you will be
| surveilled, but the surveillance will fail at exactly the
| moment you committed suicide, mysteriously, and all
| footage would disappear after a technician makes an
| innocent mistake while backing it up.
| willis936 wrote:
| Right, so then obviously in that case there was foul
| play.
|
| Is that what happened here or are people believing what
| they want to believe rather than striving to perceive a
| fact-based reality?
| the-dude wrote:
| Ehhh, pretty sure he is referring to Epstein.
| smsm42 wrote:
| > obviously in that case there was foul play.
|
| But is it? What kind of foul play - is it prison
| management hiding the fact they had somebody kill himself
| on their watch (which is professional incompetence), or
| the other one?
| mjsir911 wrote:
| I believe they are referencing to how Epstein died, which
| was ruled a "suicide"
| Notorious_BLT wrote:
| "So obviously in that case there was foul play."
|
| Correct, and the events that user described is exactly
| what happened to Jeffery Epstein, and yet somehow we have
| no public information about who is responsible, and the
| official story is suicide.
| bingidingi wrote:
| Put someone in a room and prevent them from sleeping for a
| few days and I'm pretty sure you could convince anyone to
| kill themselves. There's no absolute certainty that can
| ever be provided.
| slim wrote:
| That's murder, not suicide. I think you made a point, but
| not the one you thought you made
| moate wrote:
| I mean, I haven't done the analysis myself but "I'll tell
| this story so that if I take the cowardly way out my
| reputation will still be protected and the conspiracy
| theorists will keep my legend alive forever" has a > 0%
| chance of being the motivator here.
| fridif wrote:
| The better questions are, did he deserve to be imprisoned and
| did he deserve to die?
| babypuncher wrote:
| Whether or not someone deserves to die doesn't seem like
| much of a question when the cause of death is intentionally
| self-inflicted.
| dntrkv wrote:
| > did he deserve to be imprisoned
|
| I mean, that's kinda what happens when you don't pay your
| taxes and run from the government. He would've gotten a
| trial if he didn't commit suicide.
|
| > did he deserve to die
|
| No, I don't think anyone deserves to die. But, the most
| likely case here is he did kill himself, in which case,
| it's kinda on him.
| tiernano wrote:
| > No, I don't think anyone deserves to die.
|
| technically, everyone dies... the question should be, did
| he deserve to be killed, if he was (not saying he was) or
| did he deserve to think that was his only way out?
| vesinisa wrote:
| You are aware that he was wanted for murder in Belize?
| growt wrote:
| But somewhat ironically that was not what he was
| imprisoned for.
| zamalek wrote:
| For anyone wondering: "the Spanish High Court approved of
| his extradition to the US on tax evasion charges." [which
| is why he was imprisoned]
| jacquesm wrote:
| It worked for Al Capone.
| chris11 wrote:
| No, the best outcome would have been a trial with a fair
| outcome.
|
| But he went down to South America, started making drugs,
| and got accused of rape and murder. The legal system should
| assume innocence before trial, though in my personal
| opinion he was an evil man.
| stickfigure wrote:
| You got the continent wrong.
|
| I don't have much of an opinion about McAfee, but it bugs
| me a bit when people who know less than I do have
| stronger opinions.
| okamiueru wrote:
| > You got the continent wrong.
|
| I'm not the person you replied to, but, do you mean they
| got the continent wrong because Belize is in Central
| America, and thus technically North America? Seems like
| an unnecessary nitpick.
|
| If you thought he mistook Spain to be in South America,
| then, maybe the guidelines here would be of help. From my
| own experience, it is better to not assume people know
| less than you.
|
| Then again, maybe you are referring to something else, in
| which case it would be nice to know what.
| beebeepka wrote:
| What ecil did he do? Take drugs?
| viro wrote:
| he was wanted for murder in Belize....
| beebeepka wrote:
| I know that. Did he do it, or did he just piss the wrong
| US "officias". Downvote all you want. This guy clearly
| did not kill himself
| viro wrote:
| you know his life was basically over right? He was 75
| years old . He was going to jail for at least 20 years.
| beebeepka wrote:
| That doesn't make him a murderer or suicidal.
| viro wrote:
| bruh ... who wouldn't be a lil suicidal when they find
| out they are going to jail for the rest of their life.
| beebeepka wrote:
| But you just said he was 75 years old. That's not a lot
| of jail time.
|
| Some guys are suicided, others simply decide to change
| their gender in jail. If you don't see how this works,
| then I have nothing more to say to you
| weare138 wrote:
| I don't think anyone here is arguing he deserved to die,
| but he definitely wasn't innocent either.
| bingidingi wrote:
| Those really aren't good questions at all.
|
| He was imprisoned awaiting extradition for tax evasion
| charges, so guilt wasn't really determined yet. He did flee
| the US to avoid these charges and has since racked up a
| considerable trail of charges from foreign governments.
|
| We'll probably never see direct evidence of his death. But
| suicide is plausible, given his history, I'd certainly
| believe he'd contemplate suicide when faced with a life in
| prison.
| SquishyPanda23 wrote:
| > did he deserve to die?
|
| Is there a coherent answer to this in the case of suicide?
|
| I feel like we enter a liar's paradox since the entity who
| decides whether you deserve to die is yourself.
| fridif wrote:
| Aaron Swartz?
| vbo wrote:
| Why is this downvoted? Was he actually convicted?
| tylersmith wrote:
| He was in jail pending extradition hearings. Extradition
| was approved today and he was soon to be relocated to the
| US to stand trial.
| HNfriend234 wrote:
| True but it is also possible that he was assisnated. People
| get assisnate all the time for political reasons.
| prvc wrote:
| He could have killed himself anyway--- that is _obvious_ ,
| but his past statements still need to be taken seriously, and
| extra care and doubt need to be applied to the reported
| story.
| fastball wrote:
| _Do_ the past statements of a clearly unhinged individual
| need to be taken seriously?
| whydoyoucare wrote:
| Unless you are very sure that McAfee was "clearly
| unhinged individual", it is a strong statement and ad
| hominem. Doesn't help add to the discussion than mere
| gossip.
| fastball wrote:
| The man said he would eat his own dick on TV[1] if
| Bitcoin didn't hit $500k in 2020. There are credible
| reports he paid women to shit in his mouth from a
| hammock. There is his entire twitter feed. I am _very_
| sure McAfee was a "clearly unhinged individual", and if
| you're not I'd like to know what kind of evidence you
| need.
|
| [1] http://dickening.com/
| StevenRayOrr wrote:
| We don't have to go any further than the tweet that
| started this thread: McAfee claimed to be "getting subtle
| messages" from officials in the American government
| threatening to kill him.
|
| He was a clearly unhinged individual.
| read_if_gay_ wrote:
| Nice circular logic.
| oauea wrote:
| Yes.
| fastball wrote:
| So every statement should always be taken seriously? Is
| there no minimum bar of credibility that should be met?
| StevenRayOrr wrote:
| > his past statements still need to be taken seriously, and
| extra care and doubt need to be applied to the reported
| story.
|
| Why? The fact that he had a paranoid fantasy of being
| murdered by the US government doesn't make it so. I don't
| have to take extra care with the ramblings of conspiracy
| theorists with a long history of outright bullshit.
| Hamuko wrote:
| > _his past statements still need to be taken seriously_
|
| Like the one where he promised to eat his own penis?
| moralestapia wrote:
| As they saying goes, they dig their own graves.
| colordrops wrote:
| It is indeed an alternative possiblity, but the possiblity
| that he was murdered should not be discounted. Murdering
| those that challenge authority has been happening since the
| dawn of history and nothing has fundamentally changed. Well
| other than needing to make it look like a suicide since
| modern society likes to believe it's enlightened.
| notafraudster wrote:
| McAfee was an obviously unhinged lunatic peddling fringe
| nonsense. You can make an argument that cryptocurrency
| poses a threat to the state, but a 75 year old man who
| spends 16 hours a day rambling on twitter about fringe
| stuff does not. The available evidence points strongly to a
| deeply mentally ill guy facing life in prison and killing
| himself.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > You can make an argument that cryptocurrency poses a
| threat to the state, but a 75 year old man who spends 16
| hours a day rambling on twitter about fringe stuff does
| not.
|
| Unless they are, e.g., also head of state and government,
| but that's not an issue with McAfee, though its not
| unheard of.
| colechristensen wrote:
| Unhinged folks can be murdered by state actors outside
| the law too...
|
| This is one of those situations which may well just be
| impossible to unravel in a satisfactory way.
|
| In fact, if you're clever and in intelligence, a good way
| to cover your tracks and generally be nefarious is to
| provide a reason for your desired outcome to happen. In
| other words, do what you can to encourage the unhinged
| tendencies of your target so that they might actually do
| it themselves or at least it will seem more plausible
| that they did.
| colordrops wrote:
| "obviously an unhinged lunatic". That's a very strong
| statement that doesn't add to the discussion other than
| to trigger fear of association among commenters here.
| Facts are always better than ad hominem.
| the-dude wrote:
| > but a 75 year old man who spends 16 hours a day
| rambling on twitter about fringe stuff does not
|
| Are we still talking about McAfee here? I am coveted.
| twiddling wrote:
| or he was mentally unstable and not being treated for
| that...
| Me1000 wrote:
| It should absolutely be discounted, there's literally no
| evidence suggesting he was murdered.
|
| He was about to be extradited, the US Government was well
| on their way to making an example of him. There was no
| incentive to murder him.
| gpt5 wrote:
| Also of note - suicide in the US is extremely difficult
| if you've been identified as someone with intention. You
| get checked on every 15 minutes, including at night
| (which can be a torture by itself)
| 1-6 wrote:
| There's a saying, you can't escape death and taxes.
| onemoresoop wrote:
| You can escape taxes with death though
| chadlavi wrote:
| yep, mental illness sure is sad.
| aeturnum wrote:
| The trait that carried McAfee furthest was, in hindsight, his
| incredible talent as a hype man. He effectively created an
| image as a larger-than-life figure who those in power were
| afraid of and wished to stop.
|
| I have no trouble believing that people wanted him dead in
| general. He was credibly accused of both murder and sexual
| assault[1]. I am sure he was annoying to many officials, but
| most of the reports of death threats around McAfee were those
| experienced by the people _he_ disliked.
|
| I think that the simplest and most straightforward explanation
| is that this tweet (and tattoo) were another promotional stunt
| for someone trying to get out of the charges against him. It
| would be another in a long line of claims McAfee made on
| various topics which had the effect of, however briefly,
| centering himself in the eye of the public. He wasn't adverse
| to extreme actions and I have no trouble believing that he
| would both get that tattoo and decide later to end his own
| life.
|
| [1] https://www.theverge.com/2016/9/12/12887124/john-mcafee-
| rape...
| elisaado wrote:
| Because twitter seems to be rate limiting access to this tweet
| ("Something went wrong, try reloading"), here is an archived
| version
|
| https://web.archive.org/web/20201005231441/https://twitter.c...
| BTCOG wrote:
| This. Gonna be grand when he faked his death and paid off a
| couple prison guards 10+ BTC to escape and shows up elsewhere
| in a year or two. One can hope, anyway. Plus, he had to get out
| of eating his own dick.
|
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/131680121508322509...
| dieortin wrote:
| I don't think prisons in Spain work like that.
| babypuncher wrote:
| Why would one hope for him to escape justice?
| shapefrog wrote:
| Because it is cruel and unusual to punish someone for
| hyperbole, severing a mans penis and making them eat it is
| not justice.
| dntrkv wrote:
| Why would anyone want him dead? I don't think anyone cared
| about him that much.
| weare138 wrote:
| This. The guy was just some drug-addled tech industry has
| been that shilled crypto scams and dodged his taxes. I think
| all those bathsalts were making him paranoid.
| boomboomsubban wrote:
| If people had reason to kill him, it would likely be that he
| knew scandalous information. The public wouldn't really know
| that people cared about him or what that information was.
|
| I have no idea if McAfee had such knowledge, but "I don't
| know any reason why someone would kill him" doesn't mean
| much.
| bena wrote:
| What he knows is immaterial though.
|
| Whatever McAfee would "reveal" would just be his word.
| Which isn't great. Unless he knows how to obtain evidence
| of things, what he "knows" is just rambling.
|
| Movies have instilled in us this notion that simply knowing
| something is good enough. It's not. Let's pretend for a
| second that McAfee _knew_ that certain public figures were,
| without a doubt, 100%, Satanic pedophile lizard people or
| whatever the flavor of the month panic is.
|
| If his only proof of this is that he saw Person X devour a
| live baby while molesting children in the basement of a
| pizza parlor, it's kind of meaningless. It's not much
| better than just saying you know it because you believe it
| really strongly.
|
| The information he would have to know would be specific to
| uncover something in a way that people could actually act
| on that information.
|
| Otherwise, it's like what Bill Murray whispered in my ear
| after he painted my house last night, "No one will ever
| believe you".
| boomboomsubban wrote:
| It's not impossible that his word could provide evidence,
| he may know where (possibly metaphorical) bodies are
| buried.
| [deleted]
| bshoemaker wrote:
| The more simple explanation would probably be "a person doing
| this doesn't have a firm grip on reality, and might be a
| suicide risk"
| stusmall wrote:
| There was a ruling today approving his extradition to the US.
| US officials were about to get him and he was facing extremely
| serious charges. That's a really important bit of context to
| keep in mind before jumping to ideas that some shadowy "they"
| had him killed.
| paulpauper wrote:
| I have hard time believing this, either that he died or his
| motive. Tax evasion has one of the most lenient punishments
| of white collar crimes.
| AceJohnny2 wrote:
| McAfee has shown time and again that he wasn't a reliable
| or rational person.
| jahewson wrote:
| Paying taxes is even less painful and he didn't do that.
| bingidingi wrote:
| He had enough charges lined up (up to 5 years for every
| count, IIRC) that he would likely be imprisoned for life.
| Goes without saying but he was also an incredibly paranoid
| person.
| paulpauper wrote:
| I doubt it. charges tend to run concurrently. If he
| cooperated and paid what he could, likely he would serve
| no time.
| CommieBobDole wrote:
| Yeah, but federal sentencing guidelines are complicated
| and it's very unlikely he'd serve anything like the
| possible maximum sentence. Trial probably would have
| dragged on for a few years and he'd eventually plead to
| something and serve a couple of years in a minimum
| security prison.
|
| That said, he was 75, so I guess even a few years could
| potentially be a life sentence.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > He had enough charges lined up (up to 5 years for every
| count, IIRC) that he would likely be imprisoned for life
|
| Usually, without aggravating circumstances, federal
| sentences would run concurrently, though thr multiplicity
| might push them up within the range permitted. So, lots
| of nonviolent up to 5 years per count crimes with no
| particular extreme factors likely adds up to...about 5
| years.
|
| Which at his age might still be a sizable fraction of his
| life, and he wouldn't be the first person to act based on
| an unrealistic estimate based on what is theoretically
| possible rather than likely.
| Hamuko wrote:
| He was 75.8 years old at the time of his death and the
| average life expectancy for a male in the United States
| is 76.3.
| jeffbee wrote:
| That's not really how that works. The life expectancy of
| an American male who already attained aged 75 is 11 more
| years.
| ufmace wrote:
| The timing does make me suspicious. I'm generally willing to
| believe he was "suicided" by some shadowy conspiracy. But if
| that's what happened, why would they do it on the day his
| extradition was approved?
|
| If our secret ninja assassins wanted to take him out because
| he Knew Too Much or whatever, they could do that any old
| time. Why do it on the day his extradition was approved
| instead of some random day 6 months ago or something.
|
| On the other hand, it seems much more reasonable that a man
| whose extradition to the US to face Federal Criminal charges
| was just approved might suddenly decide to kill himself
| rather than deal with that.
|
| Unless of course the Secret Ninja Assassins knew that and
| decided to kill him today to make it look less suspicious.
| But then we're really getting into the weeds of conspiracy,
| where any crazy thing we could dream up might have happened.
| dontblink wrote:
| Or they could only get too him in a Spanish prison and they
| ran out of time.
| bronzeage wrote:
| You literally answered it yourself: you find the suicide
| more believable today. If you find it more believable
| today, and their motivation is obscuring the murder, this
| is the perfect timing actually.
| fastball wrote:
| Unless McAfee has dirt on you, and getting extradited to the
| US with serious crimes against him means a high likelihood of
| him turning state's witness.
| jahewson wrote:
| He's not exactly going to appear credible in court.
| fastball wrote:
| When I say dirt I don't mean hearsay. I mean physical
| evidence.
| TheAdamAndChe wrote:
| Though it is also highly notable that he publicly posted "I'm
| not going to kill myself, and if I do then I was probably
| assassinated" before his death.
| dragontamer wrote:
| That was 2 years ago though. A lot in a person's life can
| change in just 2 years.
| TheAdamAndChe wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27609346
|
| He's also indicated much more recently that any "suicide"
| wouldn't be such.
| dtech wrote:
| That's also 9 months ago, "before his death" is a bit
| misleading.
| ruined wrote:
| and if he'd posted it yesterday, you'd be saying it's so
| soon that it's suspicious and he's obviously up to
| something.
|
| what's the optimal cooldown to post affirmations of life
| so that you believe they're true?
| dragontamer wrote:
| I guess I discount the words of others pretty strongly,
| especially when it comes to conspiracy theories.
|
| Instead of trying to look for evidence in someone's
| tweets, how about we look at the facts on the ground.
| Such as: was he on suicide watch? Is this jail reliable?
| Is there a history of conspiracy and/or corruption in
| this jailhouse?
| colordrops wrote:
| Very strange that you are being down voted.
| babypuncher wrote:
| The man has spent most of his life lying and cheating,
| why would anyone believe him when he says this?
| [deleted]
| nullsmack wrote:
| And then he killed himself to set off moronic conspiracy
| theories as a final FU to the USA.
| colordrops wrote:
| Which is more believable, that he was murdered, or that
| he killed himself to troll people?
| willis936 wrote:
| Truly the latter. He was not a well-adjusted, grounded
| individual.
|
| Also, what benefit is there to the US to kill him? They
| already won. Being able to kill people you have custody
| of is a weak message compared to "nowhere is safe from
| us".
| colordrops wrote:
| They don't want him in the press talking. And it sends a
| message.
| willis936 wrote:
| The message was already sent: you can't flee from the IRS
| once you are a target. Showing you're not afraid to kill
| enemies isn't nearly as chilling.
| watwut wrote:
| Prisoners dont get to talk to press all that much. You
| are 100% of time under controll. And having him in prison
| for long sends even better message then maybe-murder-
| maybe-not.
| Gigamo wrote:
| He was literally tweeting up until a few days ago. What
| makes you think he'd need the press to "unveil" anything
| "they" "don't want him talking about"?
| colordrops wrote:
| No one was paying attention to his tweets. He'd get a lot
| of attention in an extradition.
| bingidingi wrote:
| They don't want him in the press talking about what
| exactly? He didn't exactly come across as a guy that
| would flee to central america to keep decades-long
| secrets.
| julianeon wrote:
| He didn't kill himself to troll people, really.
|
| He killed himself to damage the reputation of the US
| government.
|
| He couldn't escape from imprisonment, and he couldn't do
| much to harm the government. But he could do this.
|
| It was the most he could do, so (I think) it's what he
| did.
| rchaud wrote:
| How would the reputation of the US government be
| affected? McAfee is not a popular international figure,
| and he's not a martyr for any kind of cause that people
| will rally around.
| timmytokyo wrote:
| The reputation of the US government will not be affected.
| But I can imagine that in McAfee's confused mind, it
| would be.
| svloop wrote:
| Do you realize you are ditching a conspiracy with a
| conspiracy?
| DFHippie wrote:
| Which raises an interesting question: can a conspiracy
| consist of a single person? How about if that person
| speaks to himself?
|
| More to your point -- replacing one weakly substantiated
| theory with another -- there are still degrees of
| plausibility among unsubstantiated theories.
| Cyberdog wrote:
| I have found that "I'll never kill myself. There's always
| something to live for" is something that is very easy for
| people who are safe and happy to say, and I pray that these
| people will always be safe and comfortable enough to not change
| their mind on this for their own sakes.
|
| When you're sitting in a tiny concrete box and looking at the
| very distinct possibility of spending the rest of your life in
| such a box, either metaphorically or, in McAfee's case,
| literally, the thought process is quite different. Yes, McAfee
| has had run-ins with the law before, but maybe he figured he
| wasn't going to get out of this situation so easily, and he
| didn't have that many more good years left in front of him,
| concrete box or no.
|
| Thus, I'm willing to accept this as a suicide unless and until
| compelling evidence otherwise surfaces.
| jonahss wrote:
| add to that: going through drug withdrawal while trapped in
| said box
| bronzeage wrote:
| Why does the box being in the U.S or Spain matter to him, he
| would literally be in a box anyway. From his twits it seems
| he already made peace with being jailed and even said that
| quote while in jail.
| nabla9 wrote:
| Anyone who believes that IRS or SEC sends a hitman to kill
| people because they evade taxes or run fraudulent crypto
| schemes, needs to examine their head.
|
| McAfee was always paranoid. He was not a threat to the man. He
| also lied a lot and even admitted it many times.
| [deleted]
| anshumankmr wrote:
| His body is probably not even cold yet and the conspiracy
| theories are piling up. On a Twitter thread, replies range from
| the usual RIPs to people claiming some dubious connection with
| Epstein, Clinton etc. Not claiming that you are, but I suspect
| many will use this as proof of something nefarious. Which it
| might be, but at least I feel that it is unlikely.
| duxup wrote:
| It feels like everything now starts with 'it's a conspiracy'
| for no reason and somehow everyone has to prove it isn't a
| conspiracy ... or it is assumed to be.
| duderific wrote:
| Once you believe nefarious actors are running things behind
| the scenes, it's pretty easy to apply that thinking to
| almost any scenario.
| MattGaiser wrote:
| Why kill someone they were about to get legitimately?
| celticninja wrote:
| Because whatever he says in a trial becomes public record and
| widely reported on.
| colordrops wrote:
| A lot of down voting of perfectly reasonable comments in
| this thread...
| chipotle_coyote wrote:
| That's perhaps because so many of them, are like
| virtually all of yours, persisting in pushing "he was
| killed by the government!" based, as far as I can tell,
| solely on him saying "I would never commit suicide so if
| it looks like I did, the government must have done it."
| Why are we all dismissing that, right? We're dismissing
| it because we're looking at McAfee's history. The man
| loved to make grand, conspiratorial statements with
| absolutely nothing to back them up. Take a walk through
| his Wikipedia page, and don't go "pfft, Wikipedia" -- I'm
| talking about the parts with extensive supporting links
| here. In a very real way, McAfee loved being a troll. No
| judgement on him (at least for that), but I honestly
| don't see how anyone can deny it was a huge facet of his
| later life.
|
| I don't doubt that at the time he said he wouldn't commit
| suicide, he meant it, but based on other tweets quoted
| among these comments, he was _very_ clearly in a state of
| depression brought on by his incarceration -- and, for
| god 's sake, he'd spent most of the last decade as a
| fugitive. This is a man who went to extreme lengths to
| _avoid being in prison._ So when you keep asking, over
| and over, "What makes you think he would possibly commit
| suicide to avoid spending the rest of his life in
| prison," the answer is "literally everything the man had
| been doing before he was caught."
| celticninja wrote:
| That might just be me, I seem to have attracted the ire
| of some people on HN recently.
| rchaud wrote:
| Edward Snowden has published a book, appeared on every
| podcast and talked to every media outlet since the 2013
| revelations. He's still alive (granted, in Russia, where
| he'll probably be stuck forever).
|
| I seriously doubt a drugged-up 75yo who lived outside the
| US for much of the past 20 years somehow had a hotter scoop
| on the US government's doings.
| read_if_gay_ wrote:
| Epstein has to be a suicide too then, because Snowden is
| still alive?
| onemoresoop wrote:
| > Because whatever he says in a trial becomes public record
| and widely reported on.
|
| I don't think John had any credibility left for that to
| happen. We will never be 100% sure but I lean %99.99 that
| he committed suicide. He was not the kind to spent time in
| jails. Boredom killed this man
| pfisch wrote:
| Maybe I'm out of the loop, but who cares what he says? He
| is just a crazy person who dodged taxes.
| morelisp wrote:
| Unfortunately like Shkreli, Trump, etc., he has amassed
| an army of angry young extremely online men who hung on
| his every word, and will now descend on the comments
| section.
| andruby wrote:
| Extremely online men?
|
| I think the HN community has little overlap with the
| #FreeMcAfee club.
| morelisp wrote:
| I guess it depends on how you define "little." You can
| peruse the comments here before they're flagged; it's a
| lot bigger overlap than any other community I'm in,
| including some of the worse ones like miniature wargaming
| or Emacs users.
| cwyers wrote:
| I mean, they're posting in this thread right now. Maybe
| it's not a lot of them by percentage, but they're
| certainly vocal right now.
| mywittyname wrote:
| He's also a liar and a con artist. And he's always been
| obsessed with being the object of others' obsessions.
| Like when he would claim to be the zenith of hacking
| targets, nevermind the fact that he'd been irrelevant for
| decades.
| cogman10 wrote:
| Did you ever get the impression from him that he was
| "holding back"?
| celticninja wrote:
| I wasn't saying he was, just providing a possible
| response to the question in the comment I replied to.
|
| It seems like HN is becoming more like Reddit and
| downvotes now indicate disagreement instead of being used
| to hide things that don't add to the discussion.
| boomboomsubban wrote:
| To my knowledge he never posted something like "I really
| did kill that guy." He may have still had secrets even
| though his online life was so loud.
| cogman10 wrote:
| Perhaps, but I doubt those secrets were secrets that
| "they don't want you to hear". He's never been in a
| position to get any governmental secrets and, AFAIK, he's
| not really known to have connections with anyone really
| important in government (ala Epstein).
|
| It also makes little sense that the US government would
| kill him before extradition and not after when they have
| a lot more control over narrative and investigations.
| Killing him on foreign soil makes everything needlessly
| harder for the US.
| boomboomsubban wrote:
| >He's never been in a position to get any governmental
| secrets and, AFAIK,
|
| Part of his career was at Booz Allen Hamilton, though not
| for too long. Also he was in a position where corporate
| or personal secrets may have been accessible, which could
| also explain why an extradition would lead to action.
| [deleted]
| Leader2light wrote:
| The USA has a lot to answer for. Is a man's life worth taxes when
| we just print unlimited money anyway?
|
| Disgusting. We rob the world and destroy, even so, collapse is
| coming and no amount of fake money will stop it.
| gerikson wrote:
| Shouldn't that be a _Catalan_ jail?
| elicox wrote:
| No, "Catalan Jail" is only for positive news; for negatives,
| you have to use Spanish.
|
| Come on! That is the first rule of brainwashing.
| tromp wrote:
| Please don't link to websites that snub Europeans with the
| infamous
|
| "Our European visitors are important to us.
|
| This site is currently unavailable to visitors from the European
| Economic Area while we work to ensure your data is protected in
| accordance with applicable EU laws."
| onychomys wrote:
| But how would somebody not in Europe know that the website does
| that?
| suifbwish wrote:
| I don't blame any website for protecting themselves against the
| moronic laws of other nations. It's not ok for a government to
| presume it's right to fine companies in another sovereign
| nation just because the company servers maintain data about who
| used their services when it was the voluntary action of the
| individuals using the services that caused the collection of
| data. That's like going into someone's shop and then trying to
| sue them because their security cameras filmed you.
| MaxBarraclough wrote:
| If you see the GDPR block page (as I did), here's the
| Outline.com version: https://outline.com/Sc93ds
| viro wrote:
| How about you fix ur laws then and stop banning EU companies
| from using US companies.
| bingidingi wrote:
| EU companies can do business with US companies as long as
| they're following the law. Thousands of companies and
| websites have no problem doing so.
| viro wrote:
| Tell that to the companies fined for using mail chimp. You
| might to look up the regulatory requirements to "follow the
| law". when it comes to EU companies using services from US
| based companies. Even if the data never leaves the EU...
| [deleted]
| rackjack wrote:
| I honestly forgot he existed. He always seemed more like a
| mythical character than anything else to me.
| tenerifevisitor wrote:
| Sad ending of one of the first innovators of the new technology
| era.
|
| Rest In Peace.
| DarkByte wrote:
| Why is it when I use the safari share button on my iPhone and
| select someone to share this article to the URL is swapped for
| this other nxsttv domain with an article on the same topic?
| devoutsalsa wrote:
| I choose to remember him like this:
|
| "How To Uninstall McAfee Antivirus" =>
| https://youtu.be/bKgf5PaBzyg
| bloak wrote:
| Bit of a tangent here:
|
| I notice he stresses the first syllable of his name. Is
| "McAfee" always pronounced that way, also in England, Ireland
| and Scotland?
|
| Wikipedia gives the pronunciation as /'maek@fi:/, like in the
| video. Is it reasonable to suppose that if lots of people
| pronounced the name differently then at least one of them would
| have edited the Wikipedia article to mention the other
| pronunciation?
| nverno wrote:
| what a legend
| LambdaComplex wrote:
| Very NSFW. Very hilarious.
| virgulino wrote:
| "But the strangest part of knowing McAfee was the time he
| wanted me to help start an AIDS-free sex club. I still remember
| how excited he was about his new, brilliant idea. Membership
| required a fee and an AIDS test. If the test came back
| negative, you were given a membership card, which you could
| then take to organized member parties, have lots of casual sex,
| and not worry about catching the virus."
|
| - My adventures with John McAfee
| https://www.csoonline.com/article/2616198/my-adventures-with...
| sterlind wrote:
| Anti-virus in all respects, I guess.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| ping_pong wrote:
| He has lived a very interesting life, to say it mildly. I can
| think of worse lives to have lived, especially considering how
| rich he was, how salacious a life he lead with his drug-and-sex
| filled decades and even killing someone. Ending it via suicide in
| a Spanish prison seems just about par for the course given the
| rest of his life.
| sschueller wrote:
| Sad that the punishment is so extreme and state of US prisons is
| so bad that people rather kill them selves than face their
| charges.
| krylon wrote:
| I remember that time, maybe 5-7 years ago, when he had a car
| chase with the police, followed by a little shootout. After the
| police apprehended him, he claimed he had mistaken them for his
| ex-wife, and also that he was on Xanax (and who knows what else).
|
| One of a kind, that's for sure.
| [deleted]
| G3rn0ti wrote:
| 30 years for tax evasion? No wonder he preferred to die.
|
| I mean, you'll get jail time for severe cases of tax evasion in
| Germany, too, but it's a couple of years at max and most of the
| time it's on probation.
|
| How do you justify your draconic punishments in the US which is
| supposed to be a free country?
| dumbfckeuro wrote:
| He would never see jail, hadn't even been convicted yet,
| average jail time is like 15 months in the usa, and he didn't
| kill himself.
|
| Germany max is 10 years BTW, at least google before you post
| bullshit.
| G3rn0ti wrote:
| It's 5 years. The 10 years are an amendment in cases of
| organized crime or public servants misusing their power. This
| exception exists to lock up criminals if no other charges can
| be proven. https://www.gesetze-im-
| internet.de/ao_1977/__370.html
| freddie_mercury wrote:
| Germany has more draconic laws than the US in this situation,
| so I'm not sure what you're talking about.
|
| "Under German law, the maximum term for one count of aggravated
| tax evasion is 10 years. If an accused is convicted of more
| than one count, the court can increase the maximum to 15
| years."
|
| The US is 5 years for each count, half of Germany's.
|
| Macafee was under accused of multiple crimes, which added up to
| the headline figure of 30 years.
|
| If he had been German it would have 60 years for those same
| multiple crimes.
| qayxc wrote:
| > If he had been German it would have 60 years for those same
| multiple crimes.
|
| Nope. That's nonsense. Contrary to other countries, prison
| time isn't added on a per-conviction basis in Germany.
| There's maximum prison time per crime (in this case: 15
| years) and that's that.
| G3rn0ti wrote:
| Also jail times do not add up in Germany like in the US it
| seems. If you are guilty of violating several laws you still
| receive only a single punishment (,,Tateinheit"). If McAfee
| has not declared his income tax correctly in three
| consecutive years this would count as a single violation of
| the law.
| nkmnz wrote:
| Nope, we don't add up prison time in Germany for repeating
| the same or related crimes over and over. On top, the 10/15
| years are the maximum and barely reached. E.g. Uli Hoeness,
| ex-manager of the soccer club Bayern Munich, got 3.5 years
| for evasion of ~30m dollar in a total of 7 counts, but could
| actually leave prison after sth like two years, 1.5 of which
| where ,,open jail time", so he could go to work and only had
| to sleep in jail.
| G3rn0ti wrote:
| Prison time here in Germany is limited to 15 years at max --
| independent on the number of crimes. People imprisoned for
| violent crimes may stay there for their whole life if they
| pose an ongoing threat to public safety.
| rOOb85 wrote:
| - Prison time here in Germany is limited to 15 years at max
|
| - People imprisoned for violent crimes may stay there for
| their whole life if they pose an ongoing threat to public
| safety.
|
| So... Germany DOES have a life sentence. Kinda misleading
| to state it doesn't.
| nkmnz wrote:
| It's not misleading. The prison term is 15 yrs max. In
| case of extraordinary violent crimes, the prisoner will
| be continuously evaluated and - if deemed to be a threat
| to public safety - hold on custody. Not because of the
| crime itself, but as a preventive measure. Once the
| evaluation no longer suggests a threat to public safety,
| they can leave.
| kriberg wrote:
| wouldnt it be 15 years, as thats the maximum?
| squeaky-clean wrote:
| What? It says right there "more than one count, the court can
| increase the maximum to 15 years." It doesn't say per count.
| If you're convicted of more than one (up to infinity) the
| maximum is 15 years.
| monetus wrote:
| If haven't noticed by the number of responses your comment has
| engendered, speaking in absolutes can come across as trolling.
| "You" don't justify anything; you live and affect the system
| you are born into. The united states are not united in what is
| desired from the "justice" system.
| hourislate wrote:
| The US loves it jails and they love making examples out of
| people unless of course your a corporation or a politician.
| Then you're allowed to evade taxes, insider trading, and
| anything else that is considered a death sentence for everyone
| else.
| pcbro141 wrote:
| My understanding was the IRS will give you a chance to pay back
| your taxes with penalties, and they only criminally charge
| people as a last resort. Is that not the case? Or perhaps only
| for people who aren't being egregious with their evasion.
| freeone3000 wrote:
| Livestreaming your cryptocurrency-fueled presidential bid
| while living on a houseboat in international waters to evade
| arrest may qualify as "being egregious".
| pcbro141 wrote:
| Right, I don't think they tend to imprison people who
| accidentally mess up their taxes or fail to report some
| income to save some money. I think it's typically the very
| egregious offenders who get jail time.
| dcolkitt wrote:
| Prison time for tax evasion is extremely rare in the US. Almost
| always the IRS just collects the penalty and moves on. The only
| real exceptions are either for criminals with a lot of other
| charges stacked up (eg mob bosses). Or a public figure making a
| political statement like Wesley Snipes.
|
| Not saying this is good or bad. Just saying it's how it is. Joe
| Sixpack who fails to report some cash income will almost
| certainly never see a jail cell.
| gpt5 wrote:
| Selective enforcement is bad. The fact that the law says that
| you could go to prison for one year for not filing taxes on
| time, but that it's rarely enforced means that they should
| fix the law.
|
| Using it only on "bad guys" is a recipe for the government
| punishing people that disagrees with them.
| KMnO4 wrote:
| > which is supposed to be a free country
|
| A common misconception. The United States takes the
| constitution seriously, but doesn't even rank in the top 15
| countries according to most freedom indexes.
| tonfreed wrote:
| Depends what you value. You have to really look at what the
| freedom indices are using to rank countries.
| 542458 wrote:
| Popehat has an excellent article about this sort of thing. It's
| really quite good.
|
| https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc...
|
| The tldr is that the maximum sentence of all the crimes added
| up has very little to do with what most people would actually
| face.
| srswtf123 wrote:
| The sadly honest answer is that we don't justify it. The people
| in power like punishing people.
| Trias11 wrote:
| US Citizenship in reality is an IRS trap.
|
| Now Biden wants to hire 87,000 more IRS workers to harass
| americans.
|
| This used to be a great country.
|
| Times long gone.
| romanovcode wrote:
| AFAIK U.S. is the only country that makes you pay tax even if
| you are tax resident of different country.
|
| Ironically it does not apply to corporations that fail to pay
| billions in tax.
| atlasunshrugged wrote:
| Also Eritrea :) Jokes aside, there is a waiver if you are
| earning less than ~$150,000 as a single earner where you're
| not double taxed.
| marton78 wrote:
| Well, that military won't pay itself...
| Trias11 wrote:
| >> makes you pay tax even if you are tax resident of
| different country
|
| It's not that someone is tax resident of different country.
|
| The disgusting part of this IRS racket is that US forces
| people to pay taxes to US even if they no longer live
| there. Eritrea is the only another one like US in this
| aspect.
| carl_dr wrote:
| The US and Eritrea.
|
| I knew this was a thing, but I had always assumed a US
| citizen living abroad only ended up paying tax to the IRS
| if the tax they paid to the foreign government was less
| than what they would have paid to the US, and only the
| difference is paid.
|
| But it seems that's not the case, and you get an exemption
| for "only" the first $108,700 of your earnings.
|
| As with everything the IRS does, it seems complex and full
| of exemptions, but I have read that (badically) correctly?
| You could end you being double taxed if you earn more than
| that?
| Trias11 wrote:
| Why person needs to go through the hassles and expenses
| to file tax return every year to the country where he/she
| doesn't not live in any longer?
|
| What kind of state sponsored racket is this?
| vinay427 wrote:
| With the major caveat below, on the face of it, it
| doesn't seem much less arbitrary to tax by citizenship
| than by residence in certain cases. For instance, as
| someone that grew up in the US and went to public
| schools, I certainly used far more public resources there
| than in my current country of residence, and would also
| (as a citizen) have access to an indefinite further
| amount of resources such as consular representation,
| retirement benefits if retiring there, etc. It seems
| about as arbitrary to me to pay taxes in a country that I
| cannot unilaterally choose to continue living in, due to
| immigration obstacles.
|
| However, given that the global consensus is to tax by
| residence, the US should absolutely change its policy to
| avoid the hassles due to this inconsistency.
| tonfreed wrote:
| The US is one of two countries that does it. California
| wants to levy a similar thing for people moving away from
| there
| vinay427 wrote:
| It seems quite unusual to be double taxed according to
| what I could understand from the relevant laws. The first
| X amount of earned income is exempt as you noted. The
| amount above that, if a tax treaty is in place with the
| other country of taxation (i.e. your country of
| residence), is generally subject to the rule of paying
| the difference, although the details on this may vary by
| individual country and tax treaty.
| G3rn0ti wrote:
| How high is the US income tax? And is it progressive?
| smitty1110 wrote:
| Top end, which kicks in at a bit shy of $520k is 37%. Top
| end Long-term Capital Gains max rate is 20% at about $440k.
| These are numbers for individuals, they differ for married
| couples and households filing collectively.
| not2b wrote:
| The very wealthy can usually avoid paying anywhere near
| these amounts, though. Corporate owners can pay
| themselves a nominal salary and let the corporation grow.
| Capital gains are only due when stock is sold. So they
| avoid selling and borrow using their stock as collateral.
| Trias11 wrote:
| I think you're underestimating. There are Federal AND
| state taxes and that math quickly adds up.
| [deleted]
| echelon wrote:
| Not all states have income taxes.
|
| State income taxes are usually pretty low.
|
| Texas and Florida don't have an income tax.
|
| Georgia ranges from 1% to 5.5%.
|
| California goes all the way up to 13%.
| G3rn0ti wrote:
| At least that's lower than in many European countries. In
| case of the income tax at least.
| carl_dr wrote:
| (Helped by Google ...)
|
| In NYC, earning about $100k a year, the effective rate is
| ~28% tax (ie, you pay $28k tax a year), including federal
| (~15%) and state (~5%), social security etc.
|
| In the UK, for PS100k, it looks like it's 27.4%.
|
| So very similar levels.
| InitialLastName wrote:
| > This used to be a great country.
|
| When?
| ahartmetz wrote:
| Seen from over the pond in Germany:
|
| It seems like the US were (compared to the rest of the
| world) at their best from 1860ish to 1970ish. When they had
| great education for he masses, public health, technological
| and economic progress, a certain naive idealism, and the
| most comfortable middle class in the world. Things were, if
| not already good, pointing in the right direction. After
| that, selfish and cynical elites took over and society
| stagnated and fragmented.
| AdamN wrote:
| US indeed has draconian punishments. However 30 years is a
| starting/worst case scenario to encourage a plea bargain.
|
| Plea bargains are horrendous and really should be banned or
| made extremely rare.
| CobrastanJorji wrote:
| I completely agree, but plea bargains are also the basic
| mechanism by which the justice system functioned. They
| represent something like 95% of convictions. If everybody who
| currently took a plea switched to demanding a trial, we'd
| need at least twenty times as many judges and juries.
|
| I'm not against that, mind you, I'm just saying that you are
| proposing a massive sea change in the legal system.
| Everything about the recommended sentencing to basic
| questions like "what incentives can we offer to flip on
| someone" would need to be completely rethought.
| dotBen wrote:
| You're not free to not pay your taxes
|
| _(take that as an abstract comment, I have no view or
| knowledge on McAfee and his personal tax affairs)_
| tim333 wrote:
| Many countries largely limit things to taking your assets
| rather than locking you up, especially in cases like McAffees
| where I don't think he committed fraud, just refused to do
| his tax returns.
| freeone3000 wrote:
| There's an underlying element of basic cooperation there --
| you will actually surrender the assets, eg, instead of
| putting it all into cryptocurrency then sailing into
| international waters.
| danSimmons42 wrote:
| The US needs to aggressively collect these funds so that they
| can turn around and send a big portion of them to Israel. A
| constant threat of draconian enforcement ensures that
| Palestinian children can be blown up with the latest and
| greatest military hardware. And let's not kid ourselves, the US
| is not a free country. Any discussion of these issues are
| quickly shut down (via comment deletion and/or shadow banning).
| freedomben wrote:
| Not just that but as a US citizen even if you aren't living in
| the US anymore you _still_ have to pay US taxes. The 2014-2018
| income taxes he owed were while staying abroad. The US forces
| you to renounce your citizenship to get out of paying taxes to
| a country you don 't live in. IANAL but that's my
| understanding.
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| Q was his last post
| https://www.instagram.com/officialjohnmcafee/?hl=en
| rhema wrote:
| I hope there is security footage. If not, I don't like the trend
| for governments / organizations / powerful people in exacting
| justice.
| [deleted]
| bifrost wrote:
| Thats awful.
| Kharvok wrote:
| F
| JohnMcafee wrote:
| Hello.
| godmode2019 wrote:
| RIP John
| jordhy wrote:
| May he rest in peace. Sometimes is best to realize we are not in
| a position to judge.
| automatoney wrote:
| Should the title be changed to the more journalistic "died by
| suicide", or just "died" with suicide left to the article body?
| "Committed suicide" is generally not the recommended phrasing
| largely due to associations with criminality - see
| https://reportingonsuicide.org/recommendations/ as well as
| https://ethics.journalism.wisc.edu/2018/10/04/a-guide-to-res...
| and https://www.nami.org/Blogs/NAMI-Blog/June-2018/Why-
| Suicide-R...
| breck wrote:
| Don't know nearly anything about the guy, but as a rule anytime
| an enemy of a government dies of "suicide" or natural causes and
| there is no video footage I am suspect. You can buy a security
| cam and a year of monitoring for a the price of a hamburger.
| Nowadays a 3 year old can't eat a cookie without there being
| video footage.
|
| These should be assumed murders until proven otherwise.
|
| If you need a reminder of why, watch this video
| (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJujIwtdk8w)
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_al-Mabhouh
| caymanjim wrote:
| People in prison are already living under an extreme degree of
| observation and control. Now you want to deprive them of the
| last tiny bit of privacy they can hope for and record them 24/7
| in their cells?
| breck wrote:
| An interesting point.
|
| I'll clarify. Anyone _imprisoned while awaiting trial_ ,
| should have the right to live stream their imprisonment. An
| absolute dirt cheap way to safeguard justice.
| watwut wrote:
| It is absolute sure way to ensure accused will be
| threatened with violence if he dont agree with it. And then
| the public broadcast used to harass him, his familly and
| used to extract plead guilty just so that it ends.
| nemo44x wrote:
| He made it to 75 and had an absolutely insane, wild ride. What a
| scoundrel and magnificent bastard. RIP.
| EMM_386 wrote:
| McAffee ended up doing YOLO to the extreme. Check out the "After
| McAffee Associates" section.
|
| > In June 2013, McAfee uploaded a parody video titled How to
| Uninstall McAfee Antivirus onto his YouTube channel. In the
| video, McAfee criticized McAfee's antivirus software while
| snorting white powder, and being stroked and undressed by
| scantily clad women. The video has garnered over 10 million
| views.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McAfee#After_McAfee_Assoc...
| drummer wrote:
| This is one of the most important tweets made by McAfee:
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/100016379550176870...
| [deleted]
| mrverify wrote:
| I'm going to be that guy. He was suicided, probably by some other
| country that had business they didn't want him sharing with the
| USA. He was offering to help Cuba use crypto to get around
| embargo. Who else might he have helped?
| sva_ wrote:
| What a strange life he lived. I'm not going to make a value
| judgement about whether or not he was a 'good' person, but I do
| applaud the fact that he dared to deviate from the norm.
|
| "There he goes. One of God's own prototypes. A high-powered
| mutant of some kind never even considered for mass production.
| Too weird to live, and too rare to die."
|
| -- Hunter S Thompson
|
| RIP
| notyourwork wrote:
| That Thompson quote really resonates with me, thanks for
| sharing.
| gregschlom wrote:
| Read the whole book, then if you haven't already (Fear and
| Loathing in Las Vegas). Truly excellent.
| to1y wrote:
| Far from excellent imo. Repetitive and disinteresting in
| tone and topics(drugs.) Ok if you're a teenager.
| xadhominemx wrote:
| He's a murderer and fraudster. You do not in fact have to
| applaud him for anything.
| Taek wrote:
| You can celebrate someone's accomplishments without condoning
| their sins. I applaud lots of little pieces of his life and
| reject/regret many others.
| yashap wrote:
| I agree to a certain extent, but ... if the allegations are
| true, he murdered his neighbour, raped at least 1 woman,
| hired a small private army, and was possibly running drugs.
| For me, that dominates my picture of him, building an anti-
| virus company seems like a small detail in comparison.
|
| We'll never know for sure which of the allegations are
| true, but from what I've read/watched, my personal opinion
| is most seem pretty credible. If they are, I'd find it in
| poor taste to celebrate much about the man, given how much
| pain and suffering he's likely caused.
| 3np wrote:
| > possibly running drugs
|
| Didn't he have a pretty detailed site on "how to smuggle
| drugs through Central America and get away with it"? I'm
| pretty sure that was him. Can't seem to find the site rn
| though.
| ineedasername wrote:
| If he truly is a fraudster, then you cannot really trust is
| accomplishments as being his own.
| aeturnum wrote:
| I feel like there are some obvious problems with
| celebrating successes without making room for what the
| person did to achieve that success.
|
| As an example: it would be odd to celebrate Amazon's
| financial success without mentioning their labor practices.
| Agree or disagree with them, they are part of how Amazon is
| able to make money.
|
| If people are more than the worst thing they have ever
| done, then they are also more than the best thing they ever
| did. Talking about either in isolation is deceptive.
| cabaalis wrote:
| I agree with you, but I'm pretty sure the age of social
| media has us in the minority.
| doopy1 wrote:
| I agree with you guys... but this dude's accomplishments
| are few and purely self-serving.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > issuing correction on a previous post of mine, regarding
| the terror group ISIL. you do not, under any circumstances,
| "gotta hand it to them"
|
| https://twitter.com/dril/status/831805955402776576
| bogwog wrote:
| and allegedly a rapist
| f38zf5vdt wrote:
| Just like many of our founding fathers!
| tptacek wrote:
| At least one of those rape accusations was made on camera,
| by Allison Adonizio. It's not a fuzzy Twitter rumor thing.
| She accuses him of drugging and raping her.
| skinkestek wrote:
| Not saying it did or didn't happen but plenty of people
| has been accused not only on Twitter but also on TV for
| things they never did.
| tptacek wrote:
| He was convicted neither of rape nor of murder (though he
| was apparently found culpable for the murder by a US
| federal judge in a wrongful death suit). I believe he is
| guilty of both, as is my right; you might disagree, as is
| your right.
| DynamicStatic wrote:
| Guilty until proven innocent?
| JohnMcafee wrote:
| Rude
| belltaco wrote:
| Taking hard drugs can lead to deviant behavior, so I am not
| sure if people should be applauded for it.
| skidnews wrote:
| Taking "hard" drugs like Adderall and LSD can also lead to
| increased productivity according to a lot of silicon valley
| douchebags.
|
| _Looks around suspiciously_
|
| Oh god, you don't think the deviants could be in this thread
| do you?
|
| At least MacAfee took that shit to have fun, as God intended.
| stingraycharles wrote:
| That seems to imply that he lived a deviant life because he
| took drugs, rather than the other way around. This is
| precisely the type of judgement that the parent wanted to
| avoid. :)
| engineeringwoke wrote:
| Drugs destroyed his life, and it wasn't glorious. I'm not
| sure what else there is to say
| mitjak wrote:
| or did he take drugs bc his life was shit? why did you
| decide to establish this direction of causality?
| echelon wrote:
| He lived a wealthy and colorful life full of ups and
| downs. I wouldn't want it for myself, but it probably
| worked out okay for him.
|
| We're all monkeys on a space rock. I think it's good we
| have such variety.
| dwighttk wrote:
| > it probably worked out okay for him.
|
| He just committed suicide.
|
| And if you don't believe he did I'm not sure that makes a
| case for it working out okay for him either.
| TearsInTheRain wrote:
| Did you know him personally to be able to make that
| judgement. To me it sounds like lying on his taxes
| destroyed his life, or to be more charitable to him, the
| government destroyed his life
| rchaud wrote:
| So can being rich enough that no-one can check your
| behaviour.
| nonce42 wrote:
| I came across a Wired article on McAfee from 2012 describing
| his life in Belize, and it's quite a story. Starting an
| antibiotic lab, hiring armed guards with automatic weapons,
| trying to clean up drug crime in a small town, sleeping with
| 17-year-olds (one of which tried to kill him), pointing a
| loaded gun to his head, getting raided by the police and
| jailed, lots of paranoia, and that's just the highlights. It's
| worth a read.
|
| https://www.wired.com/2012/12/ff-john-mcafees-last-stand/
| twelve40 wrote:
| thanks for re-sharing, what a great read to recap his crazy-
| ass life
| nigerian1981 wrote:
| I always remember by Geography teacher correcting me on my
| incorrect use of wether instead of whether and explaining that
| the former meant a castrated ram.
| sva_ wrote:
| Thanks, I'll remember that.
| layer8 wrote:
| The way I remember how to write it is that "weather" and
| "whether" have the same number of letters.
| jonsen wrote:
| There's a bunch of wh... words. Wouldn't you know them by
| class?
|
| In my language they spell hv...
|
| Hvem, hvad, hvor = who, what, where etc.
| hristov wrote:
| It should be noted that this Hunter S Thompson quote refers to
| Oscar Zeta Acosta. Acosta made a big difference fighting for
| the rights of poor and marginalized mexican-americans in east
| LA. He did something more with his life than just take a lot of
| drugs and be weird.
| syndacks wrote:
| HST did a lot more than do drugs and be weird, but I wouldn't
| imagine a computer nerd who clacks on a keyboard to know much
| about Gonzojournalism or the effects it's had on American
| culture.
| antris wrote:
| > did something more with his life than just take a lot of
| drugs and be weird.
|
| Not everything about a person is their public image though.
| Summing up a persons life like that, even if you disagree
| with his public image, is just inhumane. Did you know him?
| Did you ever even see him once?
| smoldesu wrote:
| > Did you know him? Did you ever even see him once?
|
| We're going to need to rewrite an awful lot of history if
| our standards for judging people are "knowing them and
| seeing them even once"
| dleslie wrote:
| FWIW, if HST is to be believed, I think McAfee and Acosta
| would have gotten along:
|
| Oscar was not into serious street-fighting, but he was hell
| on wheels in a bar brawl. Any combination of a 250 lb Mexican
| and LSD-25 is a potentially terminal menace for anything it
| can reach - but when the alleged Mexican is in fact a
| profoundly angry Chicano lawyer with no fear at all of
| anything that walks on less than three legs and a de facto
| suicidal conviction that he will die at the age of 33 - just
| like Jesus Christ - you have a serious piece of work on your
| hands. Especially if the bastard is already 331/2 years old
| with a head full of Sandoz acid, a loaded .357 Magnum in his
| belt, a hatchet-wielding Chicano bodyguard on his elbow at
| all times, and a disconcerting habit of projectile vomiting
| geysers of pure blood off the front porch every 30 or 40
| minutes, or whenever his malignant ulcer can't handle any
| more raw tequila.
|
| -- Hunter S. Thompson
| serf wrote:
| should also be noted that Oscar Zeta Acosta disappeared
| during alleged involvement with drug-runners, and defended
| groups and people who now-a-days would likely be considered
| domestic terrorists (like early Brown Beret members before
| their first dissolution in the early 70s).
| drvdevd wrote:
| This is true. But he did also do a lot of drugs and he was
| also weird. See Fear And Loathing in Las Vegas for examples
| where he was portrayed as Dr. Gonzo.
| rOOb85 wrote:
| That's one of my favorite quotes. I can really relate to it.
| beprogrammed wrote:
| You win this comment section, there could not be a more
| appropriate quote for this news.
| KorematsuFred wrote:
| I remember that John McAfee was a strong supporter of
| prostitution. In one of the Libertarian party debates he said he
| is the most qualified person to support this issue because he
| married a prostitute.
|
| McAfee represented the old west styled "good outlaw" stereotype.
| Sadly, their times has passed away.
| ibejoeb wrote:
| Check out his instagram
| wcchandler wrote:
| Here's a story of how I'll remember John McAfee:
| https://www.wired.com/2012/12/ff-john-mcafees-last-stand/
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| et-al wrote:
| Can someone explain why McAfee had decamped to Belize in the
| first place and started a life on the lam?
|
| Wikipedia is surprisingly sparse here.
|
| Edit - in 2012 he was the prime suspect to the killing of his
| neighbor as mentioned here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27609243
| mothsonasloth wrote:
| He moved to Belize to "experiment" on herbal medicines to
| affect the micro-biology of the human body.
|
| Guess Belize are lax on experiments and "labs"
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McAfee#After_McAfee_Assoc...
| duskwuff wrote:
| > Can someone explain why McAfee had decamped to Belize in the
| first place and started a life on the lam?
|
| Drugs.
|
| https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2016/09/the-obscure-legal-dr...
| pjettter wrote:
| Hard to beat "a colorful life until seventy five". Looking
| forward to the facts, the movie. I don't want to judge. A person
| can be many things. A hero. A myth. A criminal. I mean,
| hyphthetically speaking. Many dimensions. But I guess in "our"
| society, one is judged after a single thing. One dimension. An
| open ended movie where you have to make up your own mind would be
| great. RIP
| gkoberger wrote:
| I feel like a lot of people in this thread are forgetting he
| likely killed his neighbor in 2012 and has been on the run since.
|
| I mean, sure he built some antivirus software a few decades ago,
| but I don't think he deserves the eulogies he's getting here.
| He's not tech's Hunter S. Thompson; he's a murderer who spent the
| last years of his life screwing over people with crypto scams.
| res0nat0r wrote:
| Folks want to make him out as a nerd/tech hero and pretend all
| of the downward spiral stuff that he did never happened just to
| keep their conscience clean.
| masklinn wrote:
| > I mean, sure he built some antivirus software a few decades
| ago, but I don't think he deserves the eulogies he's getting
| here.
|
| Surely having built an antivirus us corroborating evidence of
| evil intent?
|
| I find it unlikely that the product he created less damage to
| computers and user productivity than what it protected them
| from, especially in the last 15 years or do.
| babypuncher wrote:
| The court of public opinion does not operate on the same
| rules as a court of law.
|
| Most people still believe OJ "did it" even though he was
| found innocent. In a just judicial system, the accused must
| be proven guilty "beyond a reasonable doubt", but the general
| public are not beholden to such stringent requirements.
| People are allowed to evaluate the available evidence and
| come to their own conclusions. In the case of John McAfee,
| that evidence is pretty damning, and he's done nothing to
| temper its persuasion.
| uncletammy wrote:
| > I feel like a lot of people in this thread are forgetting he
| likely killed his neighbor in 2012 and has been on the run
| since.
|
| In America, we're supposed to be considered innocent until
| proven guilty. It's a shame it really only takes an accusation.
| [deleted]
| drunkpotato wrote:
| The legal standard for guilt in a criminal trial is "guilty
| beyond a reasonable doubt." There is a lot of room between
| "likely" and that very high standard. It is perfectly
| consistent to think someone more likely committed a murder
| than didn't, yet still have a reasonable doubt. So I really
| don't think there's any shame here.
| gkoberger wrote:
| He was found guilty in civil court in Florida and forced to
| pay $25M; he never stood trial because he fled.
|
| Also, presumption of innocence applies to the law, not to HN
| comments.
| CheezeIt wrote:
| He wasn't "found guilty," it was a default judgement.
| beart wrote:
| One cannot be found guilty in a civil trial.
| cortesoft wrote:
| If you flee the country to avoid being tried in court, we are
| just supposed to say "Oh well, guess you are innocent
| forever"?
| [deleted]
| chris11 wrote:
| > we're supposed to be considered innocent until proven
| guilty.
|
| The legal system should presume innocence. It's completely
| reasonable for people have lower standards for assuming
| guilt.
| colordrops wrote:
| In general yes, but it takes on a different form when the
| person is an eccentric that has very publicly challenged
| powerful authorities and has been both the source and
| target of disinformation campaigns.
| twelve40 wrote:
| I enjoyed following the guy's adventures (if/when it
| didn't involve killing people), but what on earth might
| attract powerful authorities that would go as far as
| killing him in a Western jail? He's not Epstein and
| mostly posted fantasies and various minor scams.
| chris11 wrote:
| He was accused of making bath salts, and he was reported
| to be involved with prostitutes and much younger women.
| His reported statements seem to confirm that, not deny
| that.
|
| I probably won't describe someone as evil for committing
| victimless crimes. But MPDV is a hard drug that's
| connected to serious, graphic crimes. I believe he was
| involved with trafficked women in third-party countries,
| that's rape. So I easily believe both the murder and rape
| accusations.
| morelisp wrote:
| 1) Presumption of innocence applies only in court which
| McAfee purposefully avoided.
|
| 2) He was found guilty in civil court.
|
| 3) If he wanted to be judged by American standards he
| should've perhaps stayed in America.
|
| 4) You're acting like accusations of torturing and murdering
| your (yes actually dead) neighbor happen regularly to random
| people. Cancel culture, amirite?
| mikestew wrote:
| "Innocent until proven guilty" is for the courts, who hold
| sway over one's freedom. It is perfectly acceptable as an
| individual to go, "yeah, he probably (because I, as an
| individual, aren't held to a 'reasonable doubt' standard,
| either) did it" just as it is perfectly acceptable to give
| some benefit of the doubt.
|
| But as others have already pointed out, a court already found
| him guilty, and it's moot anyway.
| SllX wrote:
| It's not just a legal standard, it's a fair minded
| principled default. If you have information that didn't
| make it to trial or that is not legally actionable, you can
| make up your own mind. If you saw everything the Jury saw
| and nothing they didn't see, and still would have voted
| differently, fine.
|
| Innocent until proven guilty is an admission to your own
| flaws in judging another person. You can live life without
| that admission, but they are still present within you.
| InitialLastName wrote:
| He was found guilty in a civil suit, and has been actively
| avoiding a criminal trial.
|
| "Likely" is a fully appropriate term, since all evidence
| points to that being the case, but (as you say) there has
| been no trial to subject that thesis to evidence.
| prvc wrote:
| "Likely" != "in my opinion"
| beart wrote:
| Civil trials do not determine guilt or innocence
| InitialLastName wrote:
| Nor can internet comments deprive people of material
| rights, so we're in the clear!
| devwastaken wrote:
| Court of law has rules on what evidence can be brought in.
| Courts are not the arbiter of justice, they're a system of
| justice that has flaws and errors.
| colordrops wrote:
| Was he convincted of murder, or are you acting as the judge and
| jury based on third hand media reports?
| duskwuff wrote:
| He was never tried, because he fled to Guatemala to avoid
| prosecution, then faked a heart attack to delay his
| extradition.
| babypuncher wrote:
| People aren't automatically innocent in the eyes of the
| public just because they successfully avoid seeing a trial
| for nearly a decade by fleeing the country they are wanted
| in. McAfee's behavior surrounding the charges does absolutely
| nothing to help his perception.
|
| "Innocent until proven guilty" is really only applicable in
| the context of formal judicial punishment. Absent formal
| judicial proceedings, it is completely fair for people to
| draw their own conclusions from the available evidence.
|
| Even when a court of law does come to a conclusion, it does
| not mean public opinion is required to agree with that
| finding (i.e. that time OJ Simpson killed a person)
| kyleee wrote:
| *two people
| jmkni wrote:
| > People aren't automatically innocent in the eyes of the
| public just because they successfully avoid seeing a trial
| for nearly a decade by fleeing the country they are wanted
| in
|
| It's weird how many on HN have this attitude to McAfee, but
| not to Assange.
| breakfastduck wrote:
| I don't think Assange is a fair comparison.
|
| He has influenced the world in much more significant
| ways.
| babypuncher wrote:
| That is strange, I always saw both figures as being
| popular among the *ahem* _politicized conspiracy
| theorist_ crowd that has become so prevalent online in
| the last 5-6 years.
| xtracto wrote:
| All these pro/against witch-hunts remind me of Hans
| Reiser [short] episode. When the Reiser saga was
| unfolding, there was _a lot_ of support from people that
| identified with the "nerd" group. I remember reading so
| many theories on why "he couldn't have done it", how "it
| is completely normal to remove the passenger sit form
| your car", or to buy books on how to clean a crime
| scene...
|
| Not saying I sway one way or another with Assange or
| McCafee... just that, as in Reiser's case, I am sure
| there's so much information we don't know that running to
| make an armchair judgement is most likely bound to get
| you to the wrong conclusion.
| [deleted]
| anigbrowl wrote:
| There was a whole civil case about it in the US. So while
| that doesn't prove he committed murder beyond a reasonable
| doubt, it means the preponderance of the evidence suggests he
| did.
| dfsegoat wrote:
| It is a very small community where this happened (San Pedro,
| BZ). I'm all for due process, but it was basically an open
| secret.
|
| source: my parents live in the town where it happened.
| symlinkk wrote:
| > I'm all for due process, but...
|
| Then you're not for due process
| ssully wrote:
| I am hoping it's a case of people just being ignorant of his
| life after exiting the software world. The guy left a pretty
| horrible path of destruction. Hope his victims have some small
| amount of closure from this, because they won't be getting it
| from the legal system anymore.
| godmode2019 wrote:
| You are stating something as fact, something that happened in
| another country. You are so well informed you watched a
| documentary and read some news articles.
|
| He ran for US president in the last few races. How was he on
| the run.
| duskwuff wrote:
| > He ran for US president
|
| With a campaign slogan of "Don't Vote McAfee". And he failed
| to win the Libertarian nomination in either 2016 or 2020 --
| he barely even placed in the 2020 nomination, winning a grand
| total of two write-in votes (out of over a thousand).
|
| This was never a serious campaign. It was a publicity stunt.
|
| > How was he on the run.
|
| He conducted his "campaign" from a boat in the Caribbean, and
| described himself as "in exile".
|
| https://www.cnet.com/news/john-mcafee-says-he-has-
| recruited-...
| dang wrote:
| Personal attacks like this and
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27363797 will get you
| banned here. Please make your substantive points
| thoughtfully.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| nwsm wrote:
| What do you mean how was he on the run? He (likely) killed
| himself to avoid extradition
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Was he not running away and hiding from various countries'
| authorities? Are all the articles making it up?
| jjulius wrote:
| >McAfee announced via Twitter that he would be continuing his
| campaign "in exile", following reports that he, his wife, and
| four of his campaign staff were being indicted for tax-
| related felonies by the IRS. McAfee indicated that he was in
| "international waters", and had previously tweeted that he
| was on his way to Venezuela. The IRS has not commented on the
| alleged indictments. On June 29, McAfee tweeted that his
| campaign headquarters had been relocated to Havana, Cuba.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McAfee_2020_presidential_.
| ..
| chpmrc wrote:
| > he _likely_ killed his neighbor
|
| > he's a murderer who spent the last years of his life screwing
| over people with crypto scams
|
| Well, that escalated quickly.
| nodesocket wrote:
| Here in America we have something called innocent until proven
| guilty.
| bingidingi wrote:
| "Innocent until proven guilty" does not mean "Abandon
| critical thought until a judge tells you otherwise" -- this
| guy caught himself up in crimes literally everywhere he
| went... and this was after fleeing from a $25m judgement
| against him.
|
| It seems a bit daft to think "gee, he probably did nothing
| wrong" simply because of how the American legal system is
| designed.
| babypuncher wrote:
| > It seems a bit daft to think "gee, he probably did
| nothing wrong" simply because of how the American legal
| system is designed.
|
| It's worse than that. People are saying "gee, he probably
| did nothing wrong" simply because he avoided seeing any
| trial by fleeing the countries he is wanted in.
| handrous wrote:
| It is absurd to apply that to individual, or even social,
| judgement. We don't actually pretend to be ignorant and blind
| of a person's probable or apparent misdeeds if they haven't
| been proven in a court of law, nor should we. If, for
| instance, I notice a couple small, expensive items go missing
| each time my cousin visits, I'm not going to say "oh well,
| better not tell anyone else he's probably a thief and I'd
| better keep inviting him over and leaving him unattended,
| innocent until proven guilty in a court of law after all".
| That'd be silly, and acting that way to such an absolute
| adherence to that principle would be downright anti-social.
| If he's later convicted and my family finds out I'd noticed
| years ago, but not warned them because he hadn't been
| convicted yet, and so he stole things from them because I
| didn't warn them, they'd _justly_ be pissed off at me.
|
| Or, what, are we suddenly not allowed to judge people's
| apparent behavior & deeds as soon as they're criminal, but
| free to before that? That doesn't make much sense either. But
| clearly we _can_ form and share judgements about behavior
| that 's not criminal, and that's fine. If it gets too
| serious, though, then we have to stop unless a conviction
| occurs? Huh?
| whydoyoucare wrote:
| You shouldn't discount the possibility that your kid has
| been stealing from you all along, making things disappear
| when your cousin visited everytime to throw suspicion on
| him. ;-)
|
| (Allright, I'm just trying to lighten the mood).
| handrous wrote:
| You're absolutely right about this. Future-supervillain
| children framing others for their crimes must never be
| discounted when attempting to explain any phenomenon.
| That's just basic household safety. :-)
| alphabetting wrote:
| The Gringo documentary was damning.
| joshmn wrote:
| IMDB[0] for those wondering.
|
| [0] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6071534/
| prvc wrote:
| The existence itself of that movie demonstrates that many
| parties had it in for him.
| syncsynchalt wrote:
| Much as the existence of The History Channel demonstrates
| a smear campaign against the third reich, I suppose.
| celticninja wrote:
| Well we should probably take into account that the
| programme was made for entertainment purposes and not as
| evidence as part of a trial. Much in the same way that
| reality TV is edited to make it more entertaining, this
| was probably produced in such a way to emphasize
| outrageous behaviour and the truth would have been less
| important.
| aaron695 wrote:
| Hard to know how Ancient Aliens on the History channel
| fits into this.
|
| Documentaries like money?
| camel_Snake wrote:
| I honestly can't tell if this is sarcasm or not.
| babypuncher wrote:
| This is not uncommon when you are both a notorious
| asshole and wealthy enough to make it a problem for
| everyone else
| [deleted]
| alfiedotwtf wrote:
| Say what you want about him, he lived a life that should inspire
| a lot of people in today's Instagram world... he did whatever
| entertained him while not caring what other people thought of
| him. Something mostly lost these days.
|
| I can't wait for the movie.
| TazeTSchnitzel wrote:
| Given his recent history, I suppose he probably tried to break
| out of jail and failed?
| hownottowrite wrote:
| When is he getting a black bar?
| underseacables wrote:
| End of an era. What a shame.
| beebeepka wrote:
| Just like that Epstein guy killed himself
| moralestapia wrote:
| Funny you get downvoted for stating the truth :^)
| beebeepka wrote:
| One man's truth is another man's uncomfortable thought. Can't
| have that
| Krasnol wrote:
| I doubt anybody in Spain or the US was afraid of what he could
| say.
|
| So no...not just like it at all.
| beebeepka wrote:
| Surely you are not implying countries don't ever orchestrate
| such things.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| They usually don't without being afraid of what the person
| can say, no.
| tzone wrote:
| McAfee could easily have had plenty of dirt on ton of
| powerful people. He would have given up all that info for
| reducing his sentence in the US.
|
| It is not super crazy to think that there would be plenty of
| people who would have rather see him die vs get extradited to
| US.
| motohagiography wrote:
| I didn't know him at all, but felt there was something I
| recognized and understood about what he was saying. If you must
| burn, burn bright. It looked like a great ride.
|
| This video of him playing piano is what I think he wanted people
| to know:
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/136205988701080781...
| shaicoleman wrote:
| Better quality link:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsIGKxvrG0E
| casi18 wrote:
| thanks for that video. i found myself so quick to judge, though
| i know very little about him. but seeing someone play music
| makes them human again. it seems he did burn bright. some
| people cant help but push up against the edges of existence.
| rip.
| maverick-iceman wrote:
| Any international criminal law expert here?
|
| Why can the US arrest everybody in Europe but the colony of
| fraudsters living in St.Kitts&Nevis (among them Paul Bilzerian)
| is untouchable?
| AdamN wrote:
| Tax evasion (IRS) is much more serious than a securities crime
| (SEC). Also, he did go to jail for some time.
| DFHippie wrote:
| Admittedly I haven't looked into this at all, but the likely
| answer is extradition treaties.
| voldacar wrote:
| What an incredible life.
|
| Annoying antivirus creator, Belizean designer drug producer (and
| possibly murderer), bitcoin enthusiast, international outlaw,
| possible creator of the LSJ island drone videos...
|
| I never really interacted with him but I will miss him all the
| same
| mymanz wrote:
| We need a black bar to salute this man.
| lastofthemojito wrote:
| He'd probably prefer a powdery white line.
| doggodaddo78 wrote:
| Never speak ill of the dead, unless it's the truth.. seems like a
| final, fatalist drama move. Always with the drama for attention:
| guns, police, random projects, extreme this or that, vaporware
| never delivered, moving around a lot like a psychopath.. while
| light on the getting anything real accomplished other than
| staying in the media. Sigh.
| vaer-k wrote:
| So which kind of suicide is this? A suicide, or a "suicide"?
| kyleee wrote:
| That's the fun - you decide!
| TX0098812 wrote:
| Spanish prisons are apparently among the worst in Europe
| according to some documentary I saw. I wonder if there's a
| connection.
| alfonsodev wrote:
| At least Mcafee said Spanish prisons are like Hilton in
| comparison to USA ones[1], do you have the documentary name,
| it's the one about Norway prisons? Just curious.
|
| [1]
| https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9718567/amp/Antivir...
| mrtksn wrote:
| There were serious allegations of murder and serious corruption.
| I'm conflicted on how to feel about this. Probably would have
| preferred seeing him convicted or vindicated, definitely not
| dead.
| runbathtime wrote:
| Maybe he was killed for his bitcoin/crypto? Is it a possibility?
| How can we know if it was suicide or murder?
| jug wrote:
| I'm sadder about this than I expected. :-(
|
| He was most likely a drug abusing criminal. But what a special
| mind to lose.
| balls187 wrote:
| No black band for McAfee?
| kyleee wrote:
| He probably deserves it for his tech contributions, but
| unlikely in this day and age due to the sordid nature of his
| final few decades
| anonytrary wrote:
| We should make a conscious effort to avoid this thinking.
| It's way too common for people to dismiss a brilliant man
| because of a few bad deeds or events that happened
| surrounding him. Genius is rarely accompanied by butterflies
| and rainbows. If we expect everyone to be perfect, there will
| be no one left worth respecting.
| balls187 wrote:
| I created an HN poll asking the community their thoughts.
| agiamas wrote:
| RIP John, the world will miss you. You surely lived a full life.
| boba7 wrote:
| Americans murdered him because he refused to help them spy on
| everyone with his software like other western companies do?
| babypuncher wrote:
| This might be the dumbest McAfee conspiracy theory yet.
| gbear605 wrote:
| He hasn't run any software since 1994 - if he had any power, it
| was only secrets held in his mind.
| maverwa wrote:
| It has not been "his software" for more than a decade now. He
| sold to Intel in 2010/2011.
| tamaharbor wrote:
| Nevertheless, a man is dead. May he Rest In Peace.
| patfla wrote:
| Watched about 20 minutes of Gringo before I got tired of it and
| turned it off.
|
| Sounds like a textbook case of what can happen if you take a very
| bright person and then give them a sudden windfall of success.
| That is, derangement. He or she doesn't stop being smart and even
| charismatic and so on.
|
| One question always is: what's the next act? No next act and the
| propensity to derangement goes up.
| rchaud wrote:
| > what's the next act?
|
| Very hard question to answer for those who got rich early, ,
| lived fast, but now are out of the game and direction-less.
|
| A lot of pro athletes suffer depression after retirement
| because of the absence of the daily routine. You have a
| lifetime of empty hours left to fill. Some are fortunate and
| have a network of friends and family to provide companionship
| and support. Others don't and try to fill the void with sex and
| drugs. But that just conceals the fundamental emptiness. It's
| still there, and will reveal itself the second you come down.
| cwkoss wrote:
| Jena Friedman did a great interview with him back in 2018. Kind
| of a Nathan for You vibe to it.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfe4Fjf3sds
| prvc wrote:
| Just because someone lived a colorful life does not mean that it
| is appropriate to inundate the forum with gossip and slander when
| misfortune befalls him. I believe a little respect is in order.
| RIP.
| enriquto wrote:
| One of his last messages, just a few days ago. It is sad and
| thoughtful:
|
| _There is much sorrow in prison, disguised as hostility.
|
| The sorrow is plainly visible even in the most angry faces.
|
| I'm old and content with food and a bed but for the young prison
| is a horror - a reflection of the minds of those who conceived
| them._
|
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/140301918407478887...
| azureel wrote:
| Also this tweet is interesting.
|
| https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/131680121508322509...
|
| May he rest in peace.
| vmception wrote:
| Thats not interesting when its 9 months in advance
|
| Maybe a few weeks
|
| People arent just able to make a perpetual conspiracy
| indefinitely in the future, or you dont have to entertain
| people trying to do that
|
| I wont here
|
| He has increasingly depressing messages in an increasingly
| dimmed outlook and an increasing time in prison
| MyKneeGrows wrote:
| Another one of my street pharmacist brothers bites the dust. Pour
| one out for our fallen homie.
|
| All because he dared to be human.
| virgulino wrote:
| There was a time when I wouldn't leave home without a 5 1/4-inch,
| 1.2 MB, write-protected MS-DOS boot floppy with my trusty McAfee
| anti-virus, SCAN.EXE.
|
| I helped many people with just that.
|
| It was my first contact with shareware too.
|
| Thanks, John.
| pdimitar wrote:
| Never followed his story but the translated article on NyPost
| only mentions his cryptocurrency pump and dump scheme.
|
| Which naturally leads me to the question, why was McAffee pursued
| for this all the way to Europe but Elon Musk isn't even
| investigated while millions watched him do the same?
|
| I am not loading this politically at all. I am not from the US
| and I am mostly apathetic to celebrities. But I am genuinely
| curious why is it OK for one guy to do it and very illegal for
| another one doing the same?
| Barrin92 wrote:
| Musk was fined 40 million for his stock tweets but I don't
| think he technically ever engaged in any crypto pump and dump
| because I don't think he ever actually held (or dumped) any
| crypto. I assume you have to actually financially benefit from
| such a scheme to commit some sort of crime. Otherwise you're
| basically just shitposting about crypto.
| jfrunyon wrote:
| Did you miss the "Tesla buys billions of USD in bitcoin"
| headlines? Along with the "will accept payment in BTC" pump
| and "never mind, selling" dump?
| Barrin92 wrote:
| did they actually dump their bitcoin? If yes I'd agree that
| it deserves attention but I don't think that's the case.
| Probably for that reason Elon actually posted in May or
| whatever that they have not sold their coins.
|
| Unless you can show that he actually mislead users for
| financial gain I don't think you're going to get
| authorities involved.
| mywittyname wrote:
| I think he's pumping crypto in order to pump Telsa stock
| price. If Telsa falls out of the S&P500, it will probably
| descend into a death spiral.
|
| Musk claims that Telsa never sold any of their bitcoins
| before the price collapsed when he reversed course on
| BTC, but who the hell really knows at this point?
| rurp wrote:
| Well technically Musk said "Tesla will not be selling any
| Bitcoin" when the policy change was announced. I haven't
| seen anything where he claims he didn't sell _before_ the
| change was announced.
|
| I have no idea if he dumped his Bitcoin before announcing
| the change at Tesla, but misleading a bunch of people
| while leaving himself a technicality escape hatch would
| be extremely on brand for him.
| jfrunyon wrote:
| Hmm I thought they had but apparently that was just the
| news being the news. (Although I'll note that Elon has
| lied on Twitter plenty of times before :) )
|
| Either way, he has certainly gained financially from
| boosting Tesla's stock, which lying about crypto is part
| of...
| hnra wrote:
| Tesla sold bitcoin before their last quarterly report.
| They were about to underperform but thankfully their BTC
| announcement made sure they could dump and then beat
| earnings instead.
|
| Weirdly, they announced they would no longer accept BTC
| (on grounds known for years) right after they dumped.
| toast42 wrote:
| https://www.coindesk.com/tesla-sold-bitcoin-in-q1-for-
| procee...
|
| This was very easy to find, and makes me question your
| position that you weren't aware of it.
| Barrin92 wrote:
| that sale appears to have taken place before any of the
| communication, so that can't have been part of any
| pump&dump scheme either.
| watwut wrote:
| Because Elon Musk is significantly more sane and did not
| actually done very same thing. Having enough sanity to keep you
| schemes just on the safer side help. He is also not accused of
| rape and murder both of which make law enforcement look more
| closely on you in general.
|
| Also, Musk is rich and powerful right now. That alone makes it
| harder to go after him as he will pay for better justice.
| McAffee is not that powerful.
| jfrunyon wrote:
| Because (according to the allegations) McAfee didn't pay the
| tax man.
| sschueller wrote:
| Neither do Musk, Bezos, Soros etc. They just manage to get
| away with it. I guess McAfee was just not rich enough and
| didn't have the right tax attorney.
| DFHippie wrote:
| There's a difference between legally paying no taxes
| despite being rich and illegally paying no taxes. The tax
| laws need to be reformed, but that's a separate issue.
| xtracto wrote:
| In Spanish we use two terms, what McAfee presumably did was
| "evasion"(evasion) which is illegal while what Musk,Bezos,
| et al. do is "elusion" (avoidance) which is totally legal.
|
| The trick is in knowing how to do Tax Avoidance.
| agumonkey wrote:
| He also said he would eat is own anatomy regarding bitcoin
| price.. I guess this bet is gonna happen in another dimension.
| C19is20 wrote:
| Doctor, doctor, my anatomy hurts?
| NakamotoSatoshi wrote:
| Respect where it's due.
| KVFinn wrote:
| Was just reading about McAfee freebasing bath salts from old
| posts on an old Joe Rogan forum and not paying taxes seems like
| the absolute least he was up to:
|
| >I've processed 23 kilos of this stuff in the past year or so,
| and bump it myself every day - in fair quantities the
| hypersexuality... is beyond belief. I have had a number of
| acquaintances (both male and female) who have rubbed their
| genitals way past the point of bleeding and still couldn't stop.
|
| >In all honesty, a first time user, or a user on a large dose,
| when presented with food, will simply figure out a way to include
| it in the ongoing sex play with their partner. If alone, they
| will figure out a way to fuck it, or shove it up their rectum.
| This is not a joke. Everything on the Tan becomes a sex partner
| or a sex aid. If only visually. I will not, anymore, let anyone
| on Tan be alone with my dogs for example.
|
| >A local brothel owner (prostitution is legal in my country)
| talked me out of a large amount of Tan and provides it to his
| working girls and their customers. The idea was to simply
| increase business by having hornier customers and more authentic
| product. It worked for a while, and then girls started taking
| larger doses and giving customers larger doses. They began
| leaving and running off with customers - some after a single
| contact with the customer.
|
| >If a person takes a large dose of the Tan and has the misfortune
| to have no partner at the time, then truly terrible things
| happen. A number of men, and women, have molested strangers after
| massive doses of the pure product (which is why I no longer
| provide it to anyone other than trusted friends - everything else
| is cut 50 to one). Twice, users on large doses have tried to
| molest my dogs.
|
| >I have distributed over 3,000 doses exclusively in this country.
| They call it SPT (I named it) and it is a seriously hot
| underground topic here. I know of at least a dozen people who
| spend virtually full time playing with this, and hundreds trying
| to get samples, which I dole out with meticulous care. Anyone
| caught sharing this with another without my consent doesn't get
| any more.
|
| https://www.resetera.com/threads/john-mcafee-this-might-be-t...
| CryptoPunk wrote:
| Abolishing taxes on movable private property, in favor of a tax
| on land ownership, would solve this.
|
| No one would be persecuted internationally because they refused
| to surrender their privacy and property in filing an income tax
| return and fulfilling the payment obligations imposed on them,
| respectively. To enforce a land tax is straightforward: you don't
| pay the tax, you are evicted from the land, and lose your rights
| over it. Who owns what land is also always known, by virtue of
| the fact that registry of a land title with the government is a
| prerequisite of owning land.
|
| Economists also consider it "the perfect tax":
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_value_tax
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