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When disappearing seems like the only option, some people take extreme measures... Join us as we explore the most bizarre and unsettling cases where individuals staged their own demise! From elaborate insurance schemes to doppelgänger murders, these disturbing tales of deception will leave you questioning what drives someone to such desperate ends.
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00:00Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're looking at people who fake their deaths under particularly bizarre as well as unknown circumstances and motivations.
00:11What's become the story is not the threat to journalists, it has become the whole fake threat to journalists.
00:19Clayton Daniels
00:21Clay said he planned to start a new life with Molly and the children after the $100,000 life insurance payment arrived.
00:29You can count on the support of small-town neighbors in the wake of tragedy.
00:32Clayton and Molly Daniels sure did.
00:34After the former's car was found burned with an unrecognizable body inside, the widow received $110,000 in life insurance.
00:41She got additional assistance from friends in Berning County, Texas.
00:44Well, it wasn't long before Molly took an eerily familiar-looking boyfriend named Jake.
00:49It was actually Clayton, who was in financial and legal troubles after violating the terms of his probation for sexual assault.
00:55He and Molly eventually confessed to faking his death with the exhumed body of Charlotte Davis.
01:00The Danielses were sentenced to decades behind bars for their unsettling, never mind poorly planned scheme.
01:06Molly insisted she knew nothing about Clay faking his own death until he came home one day about a month after the fire and told her what he had done.
01:15She just tried to portray it like she didn't know that he was alive until he just called her out of the blue about a month later and said,
01:21Hey, baby, I'm alive.
01:22Lord Lucan.
01:23From what we've seen going through the house, I suspected that the statement made by Lady Lucan may have been true.
01:34We may be looking for a body.
01:36There are many questions surrounding John Bigham, 7th Earl of Lucan, including whether he is still alive.
01:41Death certainly befell his estate on the 7th of November, 1974.
01:45The family nanny, Sandra Rivett, was murdered, with Lady Lucan claiming that her husband admitted to the act before attacking her.
01:52The suspect left behind letters disputing the scenario as he disappeared the following morning.
01:57The police believe Lucan left the Clermont Club and drove straight to Lower Belgrave Street, a journey they acknowledge takes between 7 and 12 minutes to commit the murder.
02:07His car was later found abandoned with a note suggesting Lucan's intent to take his own life.
02:11However, the investigation found no evidence of his death.
02:14Lucan was later convicted of homicide in absentee and legally declared dead in 1999.
02:19Whatever really became of the already disgraced British aristocrat, his legacy is tied to at least one terrible tragedy.
02:26Did the Eden Mafia get him out?
02:30Is he still alive?
02:32David Bairton.
02:33TikTok stunts often get a bit carried away.
02:35At least nobody was harmed in the most infamous prank by Belgian influencer David Bairton, aka Ragnar LeFou.
02:41Well, not physically harmed anyway.
02:44In 2023, Bairton's wife and kids shared heartbreaking tributes to his life and arranged a funeral.
02:49The solemn event was ultimately disrupted by Bairton himself and a camera crew showing up in a helicopter.
02:54The stunt became such a sensation that a helicopter became a signature of Bairton's brand.
02:59It was initially just meant to put his friends and loved ones feelings for him into perspective.
03:03Despite the iconic imagery of Bairton embracing relieved mourners, this disturbing deception probably didn't elevate most people's opinion of him.
03:10David Bairton, 45, said he wanted to see who really cared about him and who would show up at his funeral.
03:16He said he was a little disappointed that only about half of his family bothered to show up.
03:21Timothy Dexter.
03:22A great businessman always considers his public image an ultimate legacy, though not usually like Lord Timothy Dexter did.
03:28What the 18th century American entrepreneur lacked in education was made up for with eccentric enterprises.
03:34This included arranging his own wake in 1793, just to see how many people would show up.
03:39We are reminded of his kindness, his generosity, his buoyancy of spirit.
03:46Some 3,000 mourners were shocked when the supposed deceased crashed the event.
03:51Even more shocking was when he attacked his wife for not crying over his death.
03:55We can assume that fewer people attended Dexter's legitimate funeral 13 years after this scandal.
04:00But as infamous as he was in life, his luck in business isn't what he's best known for in two deaths.
04:05Arkady Bobchenko.
04:06His explanation was that he didn't have a choice.
04:16Russian military vet and war correspondent Arkady Bobchenko became notorious for criticizing his nation's government in the 2010s.
04:23A year after moving to Kyiv to work for ATR, he was reportedly shot dead outside his home.
04:28Russian intelligence quickly denied accusations of involvement when Bobchenko appeared at a press conference the next day.
04:34It turns out that he and the security service of Ukraine staged his death to weed out an alleged conspiracy to actually assassinate the journalist.
04:42They're not very happy about it.
04:43They're describing this incident as propaganda, as an anti-Russian provocation.
04:48And Michael, you can bet they're going to use this.
04:50This bizarre sting operation and even its results are still shrouded in mystery, to say nothing of controversy.
04:56In 2019, Bobchenko relocated to Israel, where he continues to openly condemn the actions of the Kremlin.
05:02I sat wrapped in a sheet, he said, and then watched the news about what an amazing guy I was.
05:07John Darwin.
05:08It was a plot that could only work in a soap opera.
05:21In 2002, British couple John and Anne Darwin were in serious debt when the former supposedly drowned in a canoeing accident.
05:28The insurance company paid out a life-changing £250,000.
05:32Mr. Darwin's waterproof jacket was found, a paddle, and finally his kayak broken into three pieces.
05:39But never Mr. Darwin himself.
05:41Five years later, John entered a London police station claiming to have been missing with amnesia.
05:46The scheme promptly fell apart when a photograph revealed that the Darwin's were looking to buy property in Panama.
05:52They were sentenced to six years in prison, in order to compensate the insurance company.
05:56They also got divorced and were disowned by their children, who were not in on the scam.
06:00There were consequences to being greedy, particularly when elaborating a wild scheme.
06:04Except that you, John, were the driving force behind the whole scheme.
06:09But that you and Darwin were central to the fraud's success.
06:16Aubrey Lee Price.
06:17He's a thief, and he's a liar.
06:20Baptist preacher and banker Aubrey Lee Price spent years cultivating trust in the community of Lyons, Georgia.
06:26After a failed Ponzi scheme cost his bank more than $70 million, he distributed letters admitting to swindling clients and a plan to take his own life.
06:34But the real strange story came to light when Lee was found alive 18 months later.
06:38His next known public sighting was Tuesday when he was arrested for a traffic violation.
06:43He told local deputies, sit down, I'm going to make you famous.
06:47While hiding out in Florida, he sold drugs, made fake IDs, and guarded sex workers.
06:52Not such a holy man after all.
06:54The pastor of many callers returned to Georgia in 2014, and was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
06:59He was also ordered to pay $51 million to his victims.
07:02Bethe says Price told him there was relief when the law finally caught up with him.
07:07Remember saying, Lord, where are you?
07:09And I looked up and there are blue lights behind me.
07:12Shahraban Kay.
07:13Her identity unpublished by the order of the German court, Shahraban Kay was desperate to escape her troubled family and marriage.
07:19But there is no justification for the Iraqi German beauty blogger's plan to fake her death.
07:24She and Emila Sosia tracked down and murdered Khadija Oh just because she resembled Shahraban.
07:29It was not long before authorities identified the victim and arrested her killers.
07:33Shahraban was ultimately sentenced to life in prison for homicide, as well as for attempting to hire a hitman to kill her brother-in-law.
07:39She may not have gotten far with her terrible death fraud scheme, but the very real doppelganger murder was a huge media event.
07:46Aleister Crawley.
07:47They took everything.
07:52But at least my name was scrawled across the tabloids.
07:57The world knew I still existed.
08:00There seems to be no end to creepy stories with libertine occultist Aleister Crawley, even surrounding his posthumous influence.
08:07The self-proclaimed prophet even rose from the dead beforehand, more or less.
08:11During a trip to Lisbon in 1930, he disappeared in the chasm Boco de Inferno, translated to English as Mouth of Hell.
08:18Fernando Pessoa claimed to be the witness to his fellow writer's demise.
08:22Three weeks later, Crawley turned up at his own art exhibition in Berlin.
08:26It may not have been his most imaginative magic trick, but it might be his most notorious.
08:30Such eccentric exploits made Crawley an unlikely cult figure for generations, to follow his actual death in 1947.
08:37Crawley's attempts to establish a new religion left him bankrupt, friendless, and physically wrecked.
08:43But he has left an extraordinary legacy of a life pushed to the absolute limit.
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09:03Irfan Ify Khan
09:06Not to be mistaken for the late, great actor, social media influencer Irfan Khan did have his cult fanbase.
09:13Then he went properly viral in the most disturbing way, with a skit in which he stepped in front of a train after being rejected by a woman.
09:20The appropriately nicknamed Ify Khan briefly embraced the rumors that this graphic act was unstimulated.
09:26After revealing that he was alive and deleting the video, he was arrested.
09:29Among the charges were endangerment of himself and others, and incitement of self-harm.
09:34While that was definitely not Khan's intention, his method for exposure was not effective in the manner he anticipated.
09:39After all, faking one's death is a disturbing stunt under any circumstance.
09:44What are some other death frauds whose revelation only raised more questions?
09:48Let's discuss them in the comments.
09:50to us.
09:57To us.
09:59To us.
10:02To us.
10:03How are we?
10:05To us.
10:06To us.
10:09To us.
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