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The story of recently captured hedge fund crook Sam Israel just keeps getting weirder. First he faked his suicide and went on the run, leaving behind a message from the TV show M*A*S*H. Then he turned himself in in western Massachusetts.

Now he's telling the judge that he actually did try to commit suicide but failed. Swallowing morphine tablets and fentanyl didn't do the trick: "I ate the balance of my fentanyl patches because I thought it was better to do myself in than to turn myself in. I woke up battered and bruised and I realized God didn't want me to do that and I turned myself in."

Ah yes -- an obligatory reference to god thrown in for good measure. It looks like we can add Mr. Israel to the long list of "born again until you're out again" criminals.

The list of things Israel stinks at keeps growing: he lost a ton of investors' money running a hedge fund, then got busted when his cover-up efforts failed. Then he tried to kill himself but failed then tried to be a fugitive but failed at that too.

By now you've probably heard that Samuel Israel, the hedge fund fraudster who faked his suicide and went on the run on June 9 rather than report to prison, has turned himself in in western Massachusetts. He will now be transferred to prison, but could also face additional charges.

The day he disappeared, his GMC Envoy was found at the Bear Mountain Bridge near the Hudson River with the words "suicide is painless" written in dust on the hood.

This was the first hint that the suicide was a fake: "Suicide is painless", the theme song for the 1980s hit show M*A*S*H, was sung during a fake suicide in the movie version of the show.

Folks, faking your death to flee from prison is no time for jokes, especially not one that suggests the whole thing is a fake. According to the New York Times, the discovery of the connection to M*A*S*H was seen as a sign that the suicide was fake and may have actually contributed to the failure of the escape attempt.

For more stories of criminal incompetence, check out the Stupid Criminal Files.

It turns out that former hedge fund manager and convicted swindler Samuel Israel III did not in fact kill himself. As I, and others, have suspected, he headed for the border after faking his suicide on June 10, the day he was suppose to start serving a 20 year sentence for fraud. But it wasn't the border we thought it was. Instead of Mexico or Argentina, it seems that he headed for . . . Massachusetts.

According to DealBook, Israel popped into a police station in Southwick, Mass., "near the Connecticut border," to turn himself in. He was talking to his mother on a cell phone at the time. No word on what he was saying, but "Hi Mom, I'm going to jail now" probably gets us pretty close.

Israel's disappearance was the subject of much speculation. His SUV was found near a bridge that spans the Hudson River, with the words "suicide is painless" written in the dust on the hood. But the police figured out pretty quickly that the implied suicide was a fake and arrested his girlfriend as an accomplice in his plot to escape prison. Soon after, a photograph of the ratty camper Israel was apparently living in was circulated in the press.

We now know he didn't get very far in that old camper, less than a hundred miles. Was it the cost of gasoline and the lousy mileage of that big V-8 engine? Maybe when Israel was setting aside the escape money he knew he would eventually need, he didn't realize that gas would cost so much in 2008. I suppose high gas prices are hurting everyone these days, even high-flying, big money charlatans like Samuel Israel.

If you have an ADR for Japanese electronics giant NEC, save it as a collectible. In light of the SEC's recent decision to revoke NEC's securities registration in the U.S., there will not be any more of those ADRs. NEC ran afoul of U.S. listing requirements when it failed to file annual reports for 2006 and 2007, and improperly booked revenues for 2000-2006. NEC was also the victim of internal fraud when at least 10 emplyees, over a period of several years, booked millions of dollars worth of fraudulent transactions. NEC had no procedures in place to authenticate or track these transactions.

To be fair to NEC, recognizing software sales revenue up front in complicated under GAAP SOP 97-2, particularly when the software is sold as part of a service package that also includes hardware and/or software maintenance. But NEC was responsible for taking steps to see it was not being robbed blind from within. NEC was delisted from active trading on Nasdaq in November 2007. NEC neither accepted nor disputed the SEC decision. The company has also been under investigation by the Tokyo Regional Taxation Bureau. NEC states it has constructed sufficient internal controls to cut back on the potential for internal fraud. Too little, too late. The stock now trades on the pink sheets.

Usana Health Sciences (NASDAQ: USNA) announced its quarterly results last night, and then, exactly one minute later, announced the resignation of Bradford Richardson, Executive Vice President of Asia Pacific.

Why did he resign? Usana says that it was to "pursue another career opportunity" and sent him off with a "Brownie you're doing a heck of a job" pat on the back: "We thank Bradford for his many contributions to USANA and wish him well with his new career opportunity. His leadership and direction over the past 10 years has solidified the Asia Pacific region as a strong and vibrant business."

And maybe that's all there is to it. But maybe not. Back in October of 2007, ex-con turned short-selling gumshoe Barry Minkow accused the company of illegal business practices in China. He said that an investigation had turned up evidence that the company uses its Hong Kong business to recruit Chinese citizens into the company's network marketing business. For more detail, read this New York Post story.

Usana denied the allegations, and maybe it's all unrelated. But the fact is that there have been accusations of bad conduct in China and Hong Kong and now the vice president in charge of that region has resigned. It makes you wonder.

When word started circulating that hedge fund manager and renowned short-seller William Ackman was set to make public a new short position, a friend and I discussed it with some anticipation. We both hoped that it would be something new and exciting -- ideally a non-financial stock and, at the very least, something other than a bond insurer. Ackman has made headlines with his prescient calls -- and publicity-generating antics -- warning of trouble at Ambac (NYSE: ABK) and MBIA (NYSE: MBI).

Well the name of the company is out and it is indeed another bond insurer. And making it even less interesting, it isn't even a short. He's betting against Financial Security Assurance which, since it's owned by French bank Dexia, can't be shorted. Instead he is buying credit default swaps on the company's bonds.

A Fortune piece discussing Ackman's claims somewhat snidely points out that his long picks aren't doing well lately. Sears Holdings (NYSE: SHLD) and Target (NYSE: TGT) have been weak performers this year. But I think analyzing a stock's performance over a few months completely misses the point -- Ackman does higher quality research than just about anyone else on Wall Street, and it can take the market years to catch up with him. In the case of Amback and MBIA, an analysis of stock charts would made Ackman look like a buffoon for years after he started raising red flags. If Ackman's research is sound -- historically, it generally has been -- patient investors should do quite well following him into Target and Sears. Impatient investors probably won't do well no matter what.

The New York Post reports that the NYPD is conducting an internal affairs investigation into assault charges filed against a woman involved in ousting Donald Trump's son from the board for the condo he lived in. The Post reports that NYPD investigation documents say the charges were "beefed up" as a result of pressure from The Trump Orgainzation.

Eugenia Kaye was accused of punching the building's resident manager in the eye. According to a statement filed by a police officer who arrived at the scene, Daniel Gozalez, the assaulted manager, "was pressured by the Trump organization to beef up the complaint against Ms. Kaye to have her arrested, because she had Donald Trump Jr. ousted as a board member of the building."

What does Donald Trump have to say about this? He called Kaye a "terrible person" but added that he knows "nothing about it." If that seems like somewhat of a contradiction to you, it does to me too. There's a juicy tale on condo association intrigue somewhere in here, but there aren't currently enough details available.

This post from Gothamist has some of the reasons Ms. Kaye got Trump Jr. kicked off the board. To many, just having Donald's Trump blood running through your veins should be a good enough reason to get the boot.

Graphic novels are generally targeted toward a market the could best be described as anime freaks: junior high and high school kids who shop at Hot Topic, listen to bad music, and read graphic novels.

For reasons that aren't immediately clear, Portfolio decided to make the collapse of Bear Stearns Co. Inc. (NYSE: BSC) into a graphic novel, focusing on the days leading up to the fire-sale to the Fed-back JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM). It's a neat idea but, by focusing exclusively on the company's last days, the comic portrays Bear's collapse as a run on the bank caused by malicious and unfounded rumors. The reality is that Bear made huge, risky bets on bad securities, and collapsed because of mismanagement. A "run on the bank" may have had something to do with it, but that's always the case: companies don't go under until people stop giving them money.

But in a financial press with a lot of very similar content, we should at least give Portfolio props for doing something a little different.

I've been following the saga of Mannatech, Inc. (NASDAQ: MTEX) for awhile, mainly because it's too good of a train wreck to pass up: a highly questionable business model, allegations of false and misleading claims about its nutritional products, and corporate governance issues that make Countrywide Financial Corporation (NYSE: CFC) look like Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A). It all started when Texas' attorney general sued the company alleging false and misleading marketing practices. Then chairman Sam Caster resigned from his post as CEO to devote more time to the company, and the company dismissed its auditor over its refusal to strip Caster of his chairmanship.

Oh, and the company has been dealing with shareholder class action lawsuits throughout this matter, alleging that the company used false and misleading tactics to boost its sales and share price. The company announced on Friday that it has settled the lawsuit, agreeing to make "certain corporate governance changes" and pay $850,000 in legal fees to the plaintiffs' attorneys.

So like most shareholder lawsuits, this one ended up being a big fat nothing, and it removes one of the company's many, many problems. The most pressing one still remains: a product of questionable merit distributed through a system that many critics believe is little more than a pyramid scheme. Oh, and the company is losing money, even with that business model. The press release is notable, however, for this awe-inspiring sentence which I believe actually contains the rare triple-negative: "However, such settlements are not uncommonly approved without material modification and, barring any unusual developments, the Company expects that this approval process will be completed within a four to six month period." (emphasis mine)

The Wall Street Journal reports (subscription required) that "Dealings with Countrywide Financial Corp. (NYSE: CFC) are becoming a liability in political circles."

Democratic Senator Kent Conrad of North Dakota is donating $10,500 to Habitat For Humanity, in a nice gesture designed to compensate for the fact that he received a loan under special terms from Countrywide -- part of a program at the company known as F.O.A., meaning friends of Angelo Mozilo, the company's CEO.

Barack Obama advisor James Johnson resigned from the campaign after the media reported that he had received a special loan, and Senator Chris Dodd has come under fire for something similar.

Political corruption is one thing and, as political corruption goes, this hardly seems worth noting, especially in the current climate. But it hasn't gotten any attention as a corporate governance matter, and it should. Angelo Mozilo was paid hundreds of millions of dollars to run Countrywide Financial and he appears to have used shareholder assets to give special deals to his friends. If he wanted to give gifts to friends, he should have done it with his money.

Is it material? No, probably not. It's just more evidence of the fact that Angelo Mozilo ran the company as a personal fiefdom -- the opposite of the way a public company should be run, but not much different from the way most probably are.

The National Basketball Association (NBA) led by commissioner David Stern, Esq. has been a spectacular financial success over the past two decades. Even after Michael Jordan hung up his jersey and people wondered aloud how he could be replaced, the league hardly missed a beat.

Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Steve Nash, Dwayne Wade, Kevin Garnet, Amare Stoudamire, and this year Chris Paul and Dwight Howard have entered the pantheon of NBA superstars adding plenty of excitement. By the time Jordan retired it was over due.

While the NBA has been making money it has been losing its luster in other regards. The brawls, bad calls, and official Donaghy's integrity fall have only served to force Stern to earn his pay working over time to repair the damage.

The current uproar about the officiating is not the result of criminal activity, or lack of effort or skill, or poor eye sight, or planned manipulation. What it is about is a lack of clarity and consistency in the game. No other legitimate professional sport ignores its own rules as blatantly as the NBA.

The most serious are the definitions of traveling or carrying. The words in the book have not changed they are just ignored. I watched Tim Duncan walk from the top of the key taking three long and obvious strides to the hoop and dunk it without a call. Guys spin to the hoop changing their pivot foot all the time. Sure it makes the play fun but it makes the game a sham at times also. It also feeds the misrepresentation of the players as "unruly".

I've been critical of allegedly steroid-pumping baseball player turned options trader turn TheStreet.com pundit Lenny Dykstra for awhile. I recently asked "Do you really want to take options trading advice from a guy who got his job as an investment guru at least in part because he sent Jim Cramer's sister a signed poster?"

Now Forbes is making a startling accusation: "Yet a close look at Dykstra's portfolio raises doubts about whether the baseball All-Star turned TheStreet.com (NASDAQ: TSCM) guru has been picking many of those stocks or relying on a seasoned stand-in."

The juicy dirt comes from a lawsuit filed against the former slugger by Doubldown Media, a publisher that had been collaborating with Dykstra on a newslettter: "At Dykstra's insistence, Doubledown began negotiations to pay Richard Suttmeier, a stock analyst, to provide Dykstra with research assistance for the Dykstra Report and who, upon information and belief learned subsequently, provided Dykstra lists of recommended stocks daily."

Remember when former Enron boss Ken Lay's wife Linda went on TV and cried that "It's all gone. We've lost everything!" in perhaps the least sympathetic televised display of misery since the Wicked Witch of the West cried that she was melting in The Wizard of Oz?

Well, it turns out she hasn't quite lost everything. In fact, she managed to come up with the cash to pay "all amounts currently due" to the Huntingdon Council of Co-Owners, the condo association for her luxury residence in Houston. The association had sued claiming she owed $109,000. In condo fees! That's enough to cover about 60 years of condo fees for my unit.

According to the Associated Press, "Linda Lay's assessment was based on ownership of nearly 3% of the 34-story building, the Houston Chronicle reported. She owns a 12,827-square-foot condo on the 33rd floor worth more than $4 million, plus 10 parking spaces and four storage units, the lawsuit said."

I'm on the floor crying with sympathy for this poor woman. Living all alone in that 12,827 square foot condo! Perhaps BloggingStocks readers could all pitch in and buy her a violin. She'd be a natural.

This post is part of a series on some of the most memorable companies that have disappeared.

"When E.F. Hutton talks, people listen," claimed the well-known slogan from the respected broker's ubiquitous ads in the 1970s and 1980s. Well, it seems people stopped listening when E.F. Hutton & Co. was caught check kiting and money laundering.

The American firm was founded in 1904 by Edward Francis Hutton. It grew to become one of the most respected U.S. financial firms, and for many years was the second-largest brokerage in the United States. Edward Hutton held the reins at the company until his death in 1962.

But in 1980 some Hutton branches began shifting funds from one account to another, effectively giving itself interest-free loans until the checks cleared. Of course the scheme eventually came to light, and in 1985 Hutton pleaded guilty to 2,000 counts of mail and wire fraud. However, the SEC uncharacteristically allowed Hutton to stay in business.

An internal investigation in 1987 uncovered that a Providence, Rhode Island, branch was laundering money for a crime family. Hutton voluntarily brought this matter to the SEC, but all signs suggested Hutton couldn't count on leniency a second time. However, this happened just before the stock market crash of 1987. With that, along with all the bad press, the firm's deep debt going back to 1985, and its star performers defecting to other firms, Hutton was on the verge of collapse by the end of the year, and so agreed to be acquired by Shearson Lehman Brothers.

This post is part of a series on some of the most memorable companies that have disappeared.

Whenever I hear a company chief executive talk about "creative destruction" or "breaking the rules" or some other business buzzwords, a chill runs down my spine. You see, I have heard this sort of talk many times before -- from a company in Houston called Enron.

I was one of the many journalists who drank the Enron Kool-Aid. It was easy to understand why. Enron was the underdog, doing battle against the stuffy electric power industry to free up markets for competition, which in turn would save consumers tons of money. Everybody would win -- at least in theory -- and Enron would make tons of money in the process. The narrative the company spun was compelling, and I bought it hook, line, and sinker.

I dutifully scribbled down electricity and natural gas prices from Enron traders when I covered energy markets. Enron traders were always a chatty bunch. Enron's trading floor seemed to beehive of activity when I visited it during tours escorted by the company's public relations staff. It sure looked high-tech and had almost as many Bloomberg terminals as there were in the Bloomberg offices where I worked as a reporter.

Only years later did I realize that the whole thing was a sham.