I told the police the canoe man wasn’t dead – I saw him driving through town, reveals John Darwin’s former colleague
COLLEAGUES of canoe death faker John Darwin knew he was still alive — they spotted him in and around his home town.
Last night viewers of a TV drama about his audacious crime saw Darwin, a former prison officer, engineer his disappearance for his “widow” to claim £250,000 insurance to pay off a mountain of debt.
ITV four-parter The Thief, His Wife And The Canoe tells the incredible true story of how Darwin, played by Eddie Marsan, returned to his home to wife Anne and concealed himself in a hidey hole.
Yet a new documentary to be shown this Thursday reveals how fellow prison officers at HMP Holme House in Stockton-on-Tees, Co Durham, regularly saw their “dead” colleague.
Police were told but did little about the reports and never picked him up.
Darwin had grown a beard and arrogantly took trips out from his hiding place.
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Prison warder Anthony Kidd, who worked with Darwin, tells the documentary: “A few staff saw him. One of the girls had seen him at Hartlepool Marina.
“Another member of staff thought he’d seen his black Range Rover and it was John Darwin with his two dogs in the back.
“The officer was going one way down the road and Darwin was coming the other.
“By the time the officer turned the car round to go after him he had disappeared.”
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Police family liaison officer Ian Burnham took a phone call from a prison officer at Holme House who used to go to school with Darwin and he had seen him in Seaton Carew near Hartlepool, Co Durham.
He was walking towards his car and he recognised his distinctive gait.
Ian tells the documentary he submitted a statement to his bosses but never heard any more.
But in her own 2018 book, Out Of My Depth, which the TV drama is based on, Anne Darwin remembered: “A prison officer reported to the police that the man he saw had a long grey beard and he was 100 per cent certain it was John Darwin.
“John’s appearance hadn’t changed that much.
“But rather than coming to my home to check out the sighting, the police fortunately — or perhaps foolishly — simply rang me.
“Astonishingly, they didn’t even follow up with a visit.”
Darwin, then 51, from Seaton Carew, set out to sea in a kayak on March 21, 2002.
His canoe was found after he was reported missing by Anne.
The couple had two sons, Mark, and Anthony, who were 26 and 23 at the time respectively.
It was presumed he had drowned after becoming lost at sea.
Former prison colleague Anthony recalled: “John was on night shift and he didn’t turn in, which was totally out of character.
“He’d never ever, ever mentioned canoeing to anybody. If you’re a keen canoeist it’s something you would mention.
“Quite a few staff didn’t believe he’d drowned. Everybody thought he’d more likely faked his own death.
“From day one that was the opinion of near enough all the staff on the unit.
“He was always polite, he was never nasty. He was just lazy.”
Search and rescue teams spent four days looking for Darwin, yet Anne, played in the drama by Monica Dolan, had picked him up from a secluded beach and he went into hiding at their home.
Darwin used a birth certificate scam seen in the espionage film Day Of The Jackal to change his identity.
The movie exposed how anyone could apply for a birth certificate and passport in the name of a dead child.
During his time hiding out Darwin had met an American woman on the internet called Kelly Steele, a mum of two.
He had talked with her about buying a ranch as an investment and when he realised colleagues had spotted him he travelled to the US to see Kelly.
Anne recalled in her book: “I was furious that he was taking off to see a woman who I’d heard him flirting with on the internet.
“He repeatedly assured me it was nothing but business. I wasn’t convinced.”
Kelly had suggested renovating a farm and raising cattle.
She said if he was prepared to invest £28,000, she would run the ranch and they could split the profits.
Anne wrote: “I don’t really know whether it was the woman or the property he was really interested in.
“But I later discovered that she had sent John topless pictures of herself, so it certainly seems he had more than just property on his mind when he flew to America.”
When he got to America, Kelly says Darwin claimed that his wife had died of cancer.
Kelly said: “I believed he was a lonely businessman who wanted to start a new life after losing his wife and wanted me to help.
“I felt sorry for him. He repeatedly sent me flirty emails.
“I told him I was married with kids but it didn’t put him off. I’d told him my husband worked away for months at a time.”
‘HE GAVE ME THE CREEPS’
When Darwin flew to Kansas on a false passport to view his investment, Kelly said she quickly realised she had made a mistake.
She said: “As soon as I saw him at the airport he gave me the creeps.
“He had huge, bushy eyebrows and long sideburns and looked like a werewolf.
“But it was his manner which alarmed me most. He never looked me in the eye and seemed empty, like he was half dead.
“He freaked me out so much I knew I didn’t want him staying in my house.
“As my husband was away my daughter was staying in my room, so I told John he could put his things in her room.
“I was horrified when I walked past minutes later and saw Darwin stripping naked with the door open.
“I was so angry I screamed, ‘What the hell are you doing?’
“But he just stood there about to pull his under- pants down in full view of me. I knew I had to get this weirdo out of my house.
“I told him I was taking him to a hotel. I was so upset I was shaking.”
Darwin later headed home and described the ranch — a shack and eight acres — to Anne as “crapsville”.
The Darwins later fled to Panama, Central America, where they planned to spend the insurance money for John’s death on a plot of land.
But in 2007 John Darwin decided to come back to Britain, claiming he had suffered amnesia.
He returned to London and handed himself in.
In 2008 the Darwins were jailed for more than six years for fraud. John also faced a passport charge.
Even while in prison on remand, Darwin could not resist sending lusty letters to a 32-year-old pen pal teacher describing the size of his penis in great detail.
When the letter was published in a Sunday newspaper this betrayal was the final straw for his wife.
She said: “What really shocked me was the sexual content of the letter, it was disgusting.
“I knew how important sex was to John and how frustrated he must be but there was no excuse for the filth he came out with.
“How much more humiliation did I have to take? I went back to my cell and quietly sobbed.”
- The Thief, His Wife And The Canoe continues on ITV tonight at 9pm.
- The Thief, His Wife And The Canoe: The Real Story is on ITV on Thursday at 9pm.
THE DARWIN FAMILY TODAY
by Grant Rollings
IT is almost 15 years since John Darwin turned up alive after faking his death.
The family have been laying low since the telly drama The Thief, His Wife And The Canoe was made.
Neither John nor his wife Anne were involved in the making of the programme.
Here is how they have tried to rebuild their lives.
JOHN DARWIN, 71
HE was released from jail in early 2011 after serving half of his six-year sentence.
He lives in the Philippines with his second wife Mercy May, who is 23 years his junior.
Mother-of-three Mercy has a clothing stall and a mobile phone repair shop. Darwin receives his British state pension.
ANNE DARWIN, 70
AFTER leaving prison 11 years ago, Anne lived in sheltered housing in York and wrote her memoirs.
The mum of two, who worked part-time for the RSPCA following her release, donated proceeds from her book to the animal charity.
She now lives in a village near Middlesbrough.
MARK DARWIN, 46
THE couple’s eldest son at first would not forgive his mother after learning of her part in the faking of his father’s death.
He relented in 2016.
A software engineer, he is married to Flick and is a father believed to live in Hertfordshire.
He is played by Mark Stanley in the ITV drama.
ANTHONY DARWIN, 43
THE couple’s younger son was said to be less forgiving of his father than Mark and has severed all contact with him, but he is reconciled with his mother.
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In a 2016 Sun interview, Anthony said: “Having him alive is much more preferable to his loss, but it doesn’t negate what he did to me.”
Dad Anthony is married to Louise.
In the ITV series he is portrayed by Dominic Applewhite from The Inbetweeners.