UK NEWS

CANOEIST’S SONS ‘WERE NOT INVOLVED IN SCAM’

CLEARED: Anthony and Mark Darwin

Tuesday December 18,2007

By Mark Blacklock and John Chapman

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THE sons of comeback canoe couple John and Anne Darwin were yesterday cleared of involvement in their parents’ alleged fraud.

Detectives interviewed Mark and Anthony Darwin for four hours.

The brothers went voluntarily to police. Their solicitor was present but Mark, 32, and 29-year-old Anthony were not cautioned.

A Cleveland Police spokeswoman said the pair were seen as witnesses, not suspects.

She added: “The results of these lengthy interviews were that there was nothing to suggest they are anything other than victims in the case.”

Mark, from Finchley, north London, and Anthony from Basingstoke, Hampshire, have always insisted they were unaware their father was still alive until he turned up more than two weeks ago claiming to have amnesia.

Ex-prison officer Darwin, 57, disappeared in March 2002. His wrecked canoe was found on the beach near his home in Seaton Carew, Hartlepool, and he was declared dead a year later.

When it became apparent to his sons that former receptionist Anne, 55, had known he was alive but kept it secret from them, they disowned their parents.

Meanwhile, police have confirmed that they have spoken to American mother-of-three Kelly Steele, 41, from Kansas.

She claims that John Darwin, whom she allegedly met through the internet, asked her to buy a farm from him with £10,000 he gave her in 2004. Darwin is on remand accused of a £25,000 fraud and of lying to obtain a false passport.

His wife is also in custody on two fraud charges relating to £162,000 life insurance policy claims.

It is understood the sons returned home after their police interviews in the North-east without visiting their parents in two Co Durham jails.