![Lawyer: Family Surprised After Antivirus Pioneer John McAfee Found Dead in Spanish Prison](http://townsquare.media/site/36/files/2021/06/attachment-John-McAfee-Youtube-via-CNBC-Television1.jpg?w=630&h=420&zc=1&s=0&a=t&q=89&w=980&q=75)
Lawyer: Family Surprised After Antivirus Pioneer John McAfee Found Dead in Spanish Prison
MADRID (AP) — John McAfee, creator of McAfee antivirus software, was found dead in his jail cell near Barcelona in an apparent suicide, hours after a Spanish court approved his extradition to the United States to face tax charges punishable by decades in prison.
Security personnel at the Brians 2 penitentiary near the city in northeastern Spain tried to revive McAfee, who was 75. But the regional Catalan government says the jail’s medical team finally certified his death.
A government statement says authorities are still investigating but “everything points to death by suicide.”
John McAfee, the security software pioneer who tried to embrace life as an outsider while running from legal troubles, including possible murder, was a cryptocurrency promoter, tax opponent, U.S. presidential candidate and fugitive who publicly embraced drugs, guns and sex, and had a history of legal troubles spanning from Tennessee to Central America to the Caribbean.
A judge in northeastern Spain has ordered an autopsy for McAfee. A forensic team would need to perform toxicology tests on McAfee’s body to determine the cause of death. Authorities say everything at the scene indicated that the 75-year-old American tycoon killed himself.
McAfee’s Spanish lawyer, Javier Villalba, said the entrepreneur’s death had come as a surprise to his wife and other relatives, since McAfee “had not said goodbye.”
(Story written by BARBARA ORTUTAY, ARITZ PARRA, RENATA BRITO and BARRY HATTON/AP)
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