Dominican Republic sends McAfee to Britain, without guns or yacht

SANTO DOMINGO (Reuters) - Tech guru John McAfee, creator of the eponymous antivirus computer software, has arrived in Britain from the Dominican Republic, where he was detained with his wife for entering the Caribbean nation with firearms on his yacht, his lawyer said on Friday.

The attorney general's office "asked him where he wanted to go, and he decided on London," said lawyer Candido Simon, who McAfee hired to represent him in the Dominican Republic.

McAfee, born in 1945 at a U.S. military base on British territory, has both nationalities. After Dominican authorities ensured the United States had no active legal cases or extradition requests for McAfee, they allowed him to choose where he would be sent, Simon said.

McAfee, who is seeking the Libertarian Party's nomination for U.S. president in 2020, recently told Reuters in an interview he could help Cuba defeat the U.S. trade embargo by launching a cryptocurrency.

On Friday, he asked his Twitter followers whether he should also campaign to be British prime minister.

The Dominican Republic's Public Ministry said it had seized the weaponry onboard McAfee's yacht when it docked on the country's northern coast and McAfee, his wife Janice, and four associates were detained..

The customs authority said it found pistols, a shotgun and bars of suspected silver on the yacht, the Great Mystery.

Authorities said on Thursday the couple had been in custody in the Dominican Republic for four days. His campaign manager said on Wednesday McAfee would leave his yacht behind him for now.

The couple left the Dominican Republic for London Thursday night with a stopover in Madrid and are now in British territory, Simon said.

(Reporting by Ezequiel Abiu Lopez; Writing by Rebekah F Ward; Editing by Tom Brown)