Spike TV has announced that they will run a six-part miniseries on the life of John McAfee — which includes an international manhunt and a murder.
McAfee is best known for his work in online security (as more or less the de facto father of online security and anti-virus software), as the founder of McAfee Associates, and now, as a potential presidential nominee (running as a member of a third party group he created, the Cyber Party). But prior to this most recent act, McAfee became embroiled in a mysterious case involving the murder of his neighbor.
Spike will use this particular watershed as the central plot in its miniseries, currently titled The McAfee Project, which is summarized by a press release issued by the television network:
"In April 2012, John McAfee, a world-renowned billionaire computer anti-virus pioneer, found himself at the center of Central America's hottest manhunt in recent history. McAfee was named a "person of interest," but not a suspect, by police officials in Belize following the murder of his neighbor. McAfee went on the run for three weeks before crossing the border into Guatemala. He was detained by Guatemalan authorities soon after entry, and was soon fighting against deportation to Belize."
The series will also follow the story post-chase, namely McAfee's claims for going on the lam (that drug cartels in Belize were attempting to execute him) as well as whether the two minor heart attacks he had while detained in a Guatemalan prison were in fact real.
Overall, the driving force behind the series is a psychological and generally thematic set of questions: who exactly is the person behind the innovator and somewhat mythic figure of John McAfee? Which story – that of McAfee's pursuers, or McAfee's own version of events – is the truth? And, perhaps most importantly, has McAfee used his knowledge of online security and cultural paranoia to fool us all?
While McAfee eventually wound up in the United States – via deportation – the case remains unsolved.
Directed by Billy Corben (Cocaine Cowboys), the series has yet to be given an official premiere date.
Via: PR Newswire
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