GUATEMALA: Tech guru John McAfee's Guatemalan attorney says he is hopeful that McAfee will be allowed to return to the United States

Record ID: 702576

  • Title: GUATEMALA: Tech guru John McAfee's Guatemalan attorney says he is hopeful that McAfee will be allowed to return to the United States
  • Date: 11th December 2012
  • Summary: GUATEMALA CITY, GUATEMALA (DECEMBER 11, 2012) (REUTERS) EXTERIOR OF IMMIGRATION DEPARTMENT SHELTER SIGN OUTSIDE IMMIGRATION DEPARTMENT SHELTER VARIOUS OF ENTRANCE TO SHELTER MCAFEE'S LAWYER, TELESFORO GUERRA, ARRIVING AT THE IMMIGRATION DEPARTMENT SHELTER ENTRANCE TO SHELTER (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) TELESFORO GUERRA, ATTORNEY, SAYING: "The legal processes are going well. They are going well because we hope to obtain the results we've proposed, which is to legalize or regularize my client's situation here in Guatemala in a manner in which he can choose or select the country he wishes to emigrate to. As he has said, his preference is to go to the United States, his country of origin. That is the best thing that can happen." VARIOUS OF EXTERIOR OF GUATEMALA'S PALACE OF JUSTICE TELESFORO GUERRA SPEAKING TO A JUDGE TELESFORO GUERRA WALKING DOWN STAIRCASE VARIOUS OF TELESFORO GUERRA HAVING HIS SHOES POLISHED GUATEMALA CITY, GUATEMALA (RECENT) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF MCAFEE ON THE TELEPHONE
  • Embargoed: 26th December 2012 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Guatemala
  • Country: Guatemala
  • Topics: Crime
  • Reuters ID: LVA1DJQY5VARRX9ZT0ESDQBF3W33
  • Story Text: An attorney for U.S. software pioneer John McAfee on Tuesday (December 11) said he was hopeful that a motion he filed will require Guatemalan authorities to allow him to go return to the United States and not to Belize.

    "The legal processes are going well. They are going well because we hope to obtain the results we've proposed, which is to legalize or regularize my client's situation here in Guatemala in a manner in which he can choose or select the country he wishes to emigrate to. As he has said, his preference is to go to the United States, his country of origin. That is the best thing that can happen," McAfee's Guatemalan attorney, Telesforo Guerra, said on Tuesday.
    Guatemala has been holding the former Silicon Valley millionaire since he was arrested last Wednesday for illegally entering the country with his 20-year old Belizean girlfriend.
    McAfee's lawyers have filed a request with a local court to grant him leave to stay in Guatemala until his legal appeals against deportation have been settled, which could take months.
    Officials in Belize want to question McAfee as a "person of interest" in the killing of fellow American Gregory Faull, his neighbour on the Caribbean island of Ambergis Caye.
    McAfee has been on the run from Belizean officials since November 12, saying he fears that they want to kill him and that he is being persecuted for speaking out about corruption in the country's ruling United Democratic Party (UDP).
    Belize's Prime Minister, Dean Barrow, has rejected McAfee's claims, calling him paranoid and "bonkers."
    On Saturday, McAfee told Reuters in a phone call that he hopes to return to the United States as soon as possible, saying that he has realized that he has become an embarrassment to the Guatemalan government and is jeopardizing their relationship with neighbouring Belize.
    The two neighbouring countries in Central America are locked in a decades-long territorial dispute and voters in 2013 will decide in a referendum how to proceed.
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