"Dead" Canoeist and Wife Charged

A man who disappeared on a canoing expedition in 2002 and his wife are being charged with deception by insurers.

John Darwin, a 57 year old father of two from Hartlepool, was believed dead after his boat disappeared in the North Sea in March of 2002. His boat was later recovered on a beach in Seaton Carew (near his home) in pieces.

However, on the first of December this year, he walked into a London police station and handed himself over, claiming memory loss. His family stated that they were overjoyed with his miraculous reappearance.

It late came to light that Mr Darwin was being investigated for three months before this. Pictures of the couple have been found dating to after his “death”, including one on a website for the company Move To Panama, with the names John and Anne. The head of the company insists that the Darwins did not use their real surname on the site. Anne Darwin moved to Panama in November this year, selling the house she was living in to John Duffield, 37. Mr Duffield said that items including computers and teach-yourself-Spanish textbooks were left. Letters with Panama postmarks also started arriving to the address.

Other questions were also raised by his reappearance. Lifeguards at the site where Darwin was believed to have drown were cynical, confirming that the water on the day in question was “like glass”; the subsequent “death” had confused the coastwatch team, especially when a canoe was found and no body, and some lifeguards have remarked that ”he may not have even got wet”.

The day after he reappeared, the man had an “emotional reunion” with sons Anthony, 29, and Mark, 31. Three days after Darwin arrived, he was arrested, along with his wife, on suspicion of fraud. He told police that he could not remember events post-2000, then modified this to 2002 a few days later.

Mrs Darwin admitted that she had been claiming on her husband’s life insurance policy after his death was declared in April, but insisted that it was “in good faith”. A debate is raging as to whether she was involved in the suspected deceit.