New twist in canoe conman John Darwin's incredible fake death plot

by · Mail Online

A 12-year-old boy has claimed to have found a message in bottle written by canoe conman John Darwin - adding a potential new twist to his incredible fake death plot. 

The bottle was discovered on a secluded area of beach in Eastbourne, East Sussex,  and supposedly contains a letter written by the notorious fraudster - who faked his own death to cash in on his life insurance policy. 

Based on what is written on the paper, the letter was penned on March 21, 2002, the day John paddled out to sea on his kayak in Seaton Carew, County Durham, before vanishing.

After his wife Anne reported him missing, a massive land and sea search was sparked, but only John's oar was found, followed by his battered canoe.

He was presumed dead, but had actually faked the whole incident, growing a beard and living in a bedsit next to the couple's home.

John was eventually found guilty of insurance fraud and sentenced to prison. He now lives in the Philippines with his new wife Mercy Avila Darwin - who said this week that she didn't believe her husband had put the bottle in the sea, adding: 'Not his writing.' 

Based on what is written on the paper, the letter was penned on March 21, 2002, the day John (pictured with his then wife Anne) paddled out to sea on his kayak in Seaton Carew, County Durham, before vanishing.
A twelve-year-old boy discovered the bottle whilst litter picking along a secluded area of beach in Eastbourne, East Sussex
The letter was supposedly written 22 years ago by the notorious fraudster - who faked his own death to cash in on his life insurance policy

After the boy discovered the bottle in Eastbourne, he took it home and opened it up with his mother. 

The pair are then said to have Googled the name and address on the letter, upon which they discovered the jailed crook's story. 

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The letter reads: 'Thursday 21st March 2002. Dear Finder. Please write and tell me where you found the bottle. I am 51, a canoeist born on 14th August 1950. John Ronald Darwin, 3 The Cliff, Seaton Carew, Hartlepool, Co Durham.'

John originally hit the headlines in December 2007 when he turned up at West End Central police station in London claiming to be suffering from amnesia.

Suspicions were raised when it emerged he was £700,000 in debt when he went missing five years earlier.

And an estate agent photo later proved that John and his wife Anne had been secretly living in Panama in central America since 2006.

They had bought a £200,000 property in the tropical country in 2007 using John's life insurance money.

But the couple hit a hitch when it turned out he would need to pass strict identity checks to obtain a visa in Panama.

Once he returned to England, the scam began to unravel. Police discovered that John had faked his own death by paddling out into the North Sea in his canoe and then disappearing.

He was declared missing when he failed to turn up at his prison job and – as his body was never found but the wreckage of his canoe did turn up – he was presumed dead.

Darwin originally hit the headlines in December 2007 when he turned up at West End Central police station in London claiming to be suffering from amnesia (file photo of John)
For much of Darwin's missing five years, he had been living in secret in his own home (pictured), where he shared a bed with his wife 
Canoe fraudster Darwin leaves Teesside Crown Court in 2014. A judge previously ordered he should repay £679,073
For much of Darwin's missing five years, he had been living in secret in his own home, where he shared a bed with his wife (right) 

The truth was that for years John had been hiding out in a rented property next door to the family home in Seaton Carew, County Durham.

Callously, Anne told their two grown-up sons Mark and Anthony he was dead, a cruel lie they have apparently never forgiven him for.

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After the truth was exposed, John was arrested for obtaining life insurance money by deception and making untrue statements.

Anne returned from Panama and was charged with a count of fraud. Both were convicted of fraud on July 23, 2008. John received six years and three months, Anne was given six years and six months.

The letter was supposedly found on August 28 during an unusually low tide in the East Sussex seaside resort.

The mother of the youngster who found the bottle, who is from Crowborough, East Sussex, said: 'It was a really low tide and it was just lying there in a really quiet area of the beach.

'We went over to pick it up as we actually thought someone had littered.

'My son opened it and removed a piece of rolled up A4 computer paper, which had a handwritten note on it.

'Then I looked again at the name, location and the date and realised this person could in fact be the infamous John Darwin, who had faked his death all those years ago.

'I was sceptical, of course, but the more I look at it the more convinced I am that it may in fact have been written by the Canoeman.

'Who uses that printer paper nowadays? The paper smells really old and was all crushed and damaged.

Mrs Darwin is pictured left in 2007, after she had been arrested following her return to Britain. Right: The mother-of-two is seen this week
Undated handout photo issued by Cleveland Police of CCTV from Kirkleatham Police station when John Darwin was taken into custody
Darwin now lives in the Philippines with his new wife Mercy Avila Darwin
Image of John Darwin that was used on his fake passport 

'I can only imagine he wrote it before he set off canoeing, making it look like he intended to come back.

In 2016, Anne penned a tell-all book (pictured) about her life with her husband

'Maybe he thought it would wash up quicker than it did, leading people to believe he had tragically died at sea.'

Dr Bablu Sinha, senior research scientist in the Marine Systems Modelling group at the National Oceanography Centre, said the bottle's long journey was plausible.

Dr Sinha said the bottle could have followed the current anticlockwise from Seaton Carew to the Skagerrak then exited the North Sea via the Norwegian Coastal Current which goes northeastward into the Greenland Sea.

Dr Sinha added: 'In an epic journey, it could have gone all the way round the edge of the Greenland Sea and exited at Denmark Strait and followed the East and West Greenland Currents all the way around the coast of Greenland, joined the southward flowing Labrador current, been entrained into the Gulf Stream and then followed the Gulf Stream and North Atlantic Current all the way back to the British Isles.

'It might have crossed from the deep ocean to the continental shelf at Goban Spur and then followed the eastward flow along the English Channel to Eastbourne.

'I should emphasise that this is all speculative. It is a plausible path for the bottle to have taken, but there might be other equally plausible alternatives (for instance it might have gone into the Barents Sea, around the Siberian Arctic, then hitched a ride on the transpolar drift and come back to the Greenland Sea via Fram Strait).

'Of course we will never know the exact path.

'It is possible that the bottle stayed in the North Sea for all that time, going round and round, or got stuck in a sandbank until winter storms perhaps blew it westwards across the Dover Strait against the prevailing ocean currents.

'I prefer to think of it making that epic journey out into the deep ocean and back.'