Death-Faking Brit's Wife Guilty Of Fraud
Husband Disappeared After Phony Canoe Accident To Claim Insurance Cash
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Cleveland Police Detective Superintendent Tony Hutchinson holds the photograph used by John Darwin on his fake passport, during a press conference in Middlesbrough, England, Monday Dec. 10, 2007. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell)
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John Darwin leaves Hartlepool Magistrates court. Today he was charged with insurance fraud and lying to obtain a false passport. (AP/PA Wire, Owen Humphreys)
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A picture of "John & Anne" (purportedly the believed-dead John Darwin and his wife), dated July 2006, appeared on the Web site of a Panamanian relocation firm and was discovered after Darwin turned himself in to police. Links to the page have been taken down, but a thumbnail is still live. (movetopanama.com)
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Two adjoining homes in Seaton Carew, recently sold, in which John Darwin lived in secret after disappearing on a canoeing trip. He was declared dead. Darwin would pass through a secret door into the adjoining property when guests came to avoid detection. (AP/PA Wire, Owen Humphreys)
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Anne Darwin, wife of the man who turned up very much alive after being presumed dead for five years, leaves the police station at Manchester Airport, Manchester, England, Dec. 9, 2007, after being arrested on her return to the country from Panama. (AP Photo/Jon Super)
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Play CBS Video Video Faked Death Uncovered John Darwin faked his death to escape debt, but his plan backfired when he was spotted online looking at real estate with his wife in Panama. Elizabeth Palmer reports.
Anne Darwin was found guilty of six counts of fraud and nine counts of money laundering after a seven-day trial at a court in northern England.
Darwin, 56, acknowledged that she had helped her husband John stage his death in an apparent canoe accident in 2002 to collect pension and insurance payments. But she insisted she had been coerced.
John Darwin was declared dead in 2003, the year after he was reported missing after going for a paddle in the North Sea near his home in northeast England.
Prosecutors said the couple kept the truth that he was alive secret even from their two adult sons while they planned to start a new life together in Panama. The plot began to unravel last December when Darwin walked into a London police station claiming to have amnesia.
Tracked down in Panama City, Anne confessed her husband had faked his death because he was deeply in debt, reported CBS News correspondent Elizabeth Palmer.
John Darwin, 57, pleaded guilty in March to deception and fraud. The couple will be sentenced later Wednesday.
© MMVII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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- idiots
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- Imagine lying to your own kids about their father having died? I suspect she''ll be waiting in vain for visitation from the two adult sons. Beotch!
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- wow thats a weird case @%^
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Best-selling author Mitch Albom on his first nonfiction work since "Tuesdays with Morrie."
