Bob McCarty Writes

TIME magazine jumped on the opportunity to write the dramatic headline, The Man Who Returned From the Sea, which appeared above a grainy photo of John Darwin, the 57-year-old man who surfaced at a British police station yesterday five years after being declared dead, the apparent victim of a canoeing accident.

Today, it appears articles like the one published in TIME and on other web sites will be followed by others that provide details about Darwin’s now-unraveling claim of amnesia.

According to published reports, such as one from the UK’s Sky News, British investigators have said a picture reportedly showing John Darwin and his wife Anne in Panama last year has “raised a lot of questions”. That picture is said to have been discovered on the Move To Panama web site, though I could not locate such a photo there this morning.

One thing is certain: Articles about the Darwins will replace others about Gillian Gibbons (a.k.a., the “teddy bear teacher”) in the news cycle for days to come.

Uncertain is whether Darwin — and, possibly, his wife — will claim Partzheimer’s as having played a role in his disappearance when it comes time to preparing a defense for his apparent transgressions.

Partzheimer’s (a.k.a., Convenient Memory Loss Syndrome) is a rare form of memory loss that affects those in the public spotlight more than any other group — especially when they are speaking under oath. According to medical experts, cases can go undiagnosed for years.

Stay tuned.

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