Hedge Fund Manager Still Alive, Fund Not So Much

The U.S. Marshals say that Samuel Israel III did NOT leap to his death after writing “suicide is painless” on the hood of his car.
Well done, Marshals, even though I could have told them that. The hood thing had all the earmarks of the first clue on any Law & Order. Please, no one is ever guilty at the 18th minute mark.

“Suicide has been ruled out,” William Dundon, a spokesman for the U.S. Marshals Service, said in an e-mail to Reuters.
Another law enforcement official who is familiar with the investigation, but not authorized to speak publicly on the matter said “the investigation is solely a fugitive investigation now.”
Israel, 48, had been due to begin serving a 20-year prison term in Ayer, Massachusetts a week ago.
Officials would not say how authorities had learned that Israel, who suffers back and heart problems, was alive. But after no body washed up on the Hudson’s shores for days, police became skeptical he was dead.
In April, Israel was sentenced for fabricating investment returns, making up an accounting firm to sign off on documents and ultimately stealing $450 million from investors, including Indiana’s DePauw University.
He was out on bail to allow time for prison officials to prepare his medication, court documents show.
In an ironic twist, Israel’s disappearance may be especially awkward for his lawyers.
Lawyers at Morvillo, Abramowitz, Grand, Iason, Anello & Bohrer, P.C. defended Israel plus another fugitive, Jacob “Kobi” Alexander, the former chief executive of Comverse Technology Inc, who is wanted in the U.S. on stock-options backdating charges. Alexander escaped U.S. authorities in 2006 and has been living in Namibia since then.

This is a good day for people who shorted the suicide contract. I wonder what the odds are that they’ll find Israel in Israel.

Posted by on June 17th, 2008 at 10:12 am


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