Man Turns Up Alive and Well Nearly 20 Years After Fake Drowning

Jan. 29, 2009— -- It's been nearly 20 years since a frantic bride-to-be rushed to the lifeguard station at a Florida beach, saying her fiance had disappeared in the surf.

His body was never found. Until recently.

Bennie Harden Wint, now 49, was found alive and well in North Carolina during a routine traffic stop Saturday. He's got a common-law wife and a teenage son named William James Sweet -- the same name that Wint had been using for nearly two decades.

Wint finally came clean after being stopped by police because the light over his license plate was out. When he was unable to produce anything to identify himself as Sweet, Wint was arrested for not having a license. At some point while the police were interviewing him, he confessed that his real name was Bennie Harden Wint.

Weaverville Police Sgt. Stacy Wyatt, who interviewed Wint, said the entire story was "kind of like a movie."

Because he had destroyed all of his Wint identification and whatever records he could find after his "death," there was no one listed under that name whom police could find either. He had a hard time even convincing officers he was actually Bennie Wint.

So the police booked him under the name "John Doe" until they could find out who he really was. He was charged with giving police a fake name.

Wyatt said Wint told him that the day he disappeared into the ocean off the coast of Daytona Beach, he was trying to escape both the authorities and anyone who may be trying to kill him.

Wint told police he was convinced that he was wanted in South Carolina on drug charges because of his involvement in a large drug ring.

"It was merely paranoia," Wyatt said. "He was running because of the prior life he lived."

Wyatt said the information he found on Wint's drug involvement was not public record and could not be released, but he said that Wyatt is not wanted on any charges anywhere in the country.

When reached for comment today Wint said he was only interested in doing interviews he would be paid for and anything else was a waste of his time.

"I can live in my seclusion forever," he said, adding that he's outfitted his property with "No Trespassing" signs.

Wint now lives in Marshall, N.C., with Sonya Tull Jones, whom Wyatt identified as the mother of his son. She likewise declined to comment today.

Not So Dead After All

Aside from the traffic misdemeanors in Weaverville, for which he was released on his own recognizance, Wint's not facing any charges at this point for faking his own death.

Volusia County Beach Patrol Officer Scott Petersohn was working with the patrol on Sept. 24, 1989, the day Wint disappeared. Although he didn't respond to the call, he remembered it well.

When someone drowns in the ocean, he said, "everybody feels it. Everybody takes it personally."

But even in 1989, there were some clues that perhaps Wint hadn't drowned after all.

"Even back then, it struck everybody as odd that we didn't recover the victim," he said. "That almost never happens."

Drowning victims who aren't immediately found by the patrol, he said, typically are located floating in the water by the sheriff's helicopter or are washed up by the tide days later.

Petersohn said that even though the lifeguard on duty that day was adamant he never saw anyone go under, lifeguards always carry "that little bit of doubt" that they may have missed something.

Petersohn said he didn't believe that Wint's then-fiancee, Patricia Lynn Hollingsworth, was in on the ruse. Hollingsworth, who would now be 56, could not be reached for comment.

According to the original police report, obtained by ABCNews.com, Hollingsworth told the beach patrol that the two had left their home in South Carolina after Hurricane Hugo and had talked about getting married on that particular trip.

As for Wint, Wyatt said he told officers in North Carolina that his getaway was quite simple.

"He told me he swam to the shore in knee deep water, walked off and never looked back," Wyatt said, adding that Wint said he later hitchhiked to Alabama before embarking on his new life.

Looking for Dad

There were other signs that Wint wasn't as dead as he wanted to appear.

When Wyatt was searching for information on Bennie Wint on the Internet, he came across a posting on PeopleSite.com from a woman named Christi McKnight who said she was Wint's daughter.

In the posting, dated Feb. 5, 2007, McKnight said she was 4 years old at the time of her father's disappearance and that she was searching for her father in hopes of helping her dying grandmother.

"Doctors say she should have been dead a year ago, but they say she's holding on to one thing, and we believe that she is holding on to my father," McKnight wrote. "Benny is believed to have been seen in FL, back in 89-90 and some have said they've seen him in Hartsville, SC, where his family is from."

McKnight declined to comment about the posting or her father's double life when contacted today by ABCNews.com.

Now Wint has to set about re-creating his life once again. Wyatt said he has an uphill battle reclaiming his life as Bennie Wint. Without identification, he'll have an extremely hard time getting either a Social Security number or his original birth certificate.

Petersohn said the beach patrol will not be going after Wint to recoup the costs of the search.

"It's been too long," he said. "I'm really happy he's alive. I really am."