Mystery of the missing millionaire

The latest act in the Sam Israel show was an apparent suicidal 150 foot plunge off a picturesque bridge spanning the Hudson River. There on his abandoned SUV, scrawled in dust his final message for everyone: “Suicide is painless”

Except no one who knew anything about the man thought he’d actually done it.

Randy Shain, investigator: I think it takes a certain amount of chutzpah to actually jump off a bridge.  I don’t see that being his m.o.

So was Sam Israel’s leap into the Hudson really just an elaborate joke? If so, no one in the federal government was laughing.  48 hours after the alleged jump, they issued a wanted poster.

Samuel Israel III was a federal fugitive until proven otherwise.

And when no body turned up after a full week, federal marshals announced they’d officially ruled out suicide as a possibility. The general reaction on Wall Street was:  what took you so long?

Maria Bartiromo, CNBC anchor: Everyone I spoke to knew right off the bat, they said “He left town. He’s on the run. Running from the law.”

The investors represented by attorney Ross Intelisano were livid.

Ross Intelisano, attorney: When he got the 20 years people were very satisfied that this man’s gonna go to jail for all the bad stuff he’s done. So that when he did not report to jail, it sort of re-opened these very sore wounds.  And the investors are really struggling with it.

The stunt earned Sam Israel a spot of "America’s Most Wanted." The Feds said he could be using any one of many aliases and should be considered armed and dangerous.

This was a Sam Israel no one had heard of before.

Shain: I didn’t see him as some sort of, you know, "Bourne Identity" kind of guy But he’s pulling it off for now. And with enough money, anything’s possible.

An army of accountants and lawyers were still sorting out the unresolved questions of what had really happened to the nearly $300 million investors had given Sam Israel?

Turns out, $100 million had been parked in an Arizona bank. Regulators there noticed suspicious transfers and traced the cash back to Bayou.

As for the rest? Most of it seemed to have gone up in smoke in bad trades. 

But some thought it was possible that Sam Israel had stashed away a sizable chunk.

Intelisano: Because the trading activity shows trading losses of under $100 million. And they found $100 million.

Dennis Murphy, Dateline correspondent: So there’s $50 million to $100 million out there somewhere still?

Intelisano: Potentially. Now, does he have that money?  I don’t know.  I don’t know where that money is.

That kind of change could certainly buy a black market passport and a one-way ticket to anywhere… preferably a nice country with no U.S. extradition treaty.

Bartiromo: Well, people thought that he had fake passports and he was leaving the country.  You know?  That he was gone. 

And so it went for a time last summer, in newsrooms and on Wall Street… speculation about where in the world was Sam Israel III. Was he in South America?  Africa? Possibly making withdrawals from a secret Swiss Bank Account?

When investigators got their first break in the case, however, it wasn’t from overseas but from clues left right on the bridge. Surveillance footage from the bridges security cameras showed a car pull alongside Israel’s SUV right around the time he disappeared. 

Sources told New York’s WNBC-TV that cops were able to trace the second vehicle to a get-away driver. The driver admitted picking Israel up on the bridge and taking him to a nearby rest stop where an RV stocked with his worldly possessions was waiting.

That led to intense questioning of Israel’s girlfriend, Deb Ryan.  She eventually broke down and told investigators that she’d helped Sam pack the RV the night before he disappeared.

She was arrested and charged with aiding and abetting.

Intelisano: I think he’s in upstate New York or somewhere, north of New York City in his RV, sleeping in random parks.

Murphy: Just eating slim jims from convenience stores?

Intelisano: And probably struggling physically, because he’s got very major back problems.  He takes serious painkillers.  So, I think one of the biggest problems he’s gonna have is actually finding his medicine. 

But in fact, Israel never left the country at all. He merely drove 100 miles north to Massachusetts and parked his RV in this $40-dollar a night campground.  There he registered under the alias David Clapp and blended in among the tourists for most of June, according to the campsite manager.

Mitch Hayes, campsite manger: He seemed like any other camper. Really nice guy, very personable, really easy to talk to. Nothing suspicious at all.

Then, on July 2^nd he called it quits.

He left the RV at the campsite and putt-putted by motor scooter to Southwick, Mass. where he walked into the police station and told the desk clerk—“I’m supposed to go to jail.”

Police press conference: He turned himself in voluntarily. He was processed as a fugitive from justice by the Southwick police department and U.S. marshals were contacted.

A crush of news cameras descended in time to see Sam Israel transferred back to federal custody. He told reporters his girlfriend’s arrest had prompted the move.

Samuel Israel, on interview tape: She was arrested. I’m not going to have people I love involved in something they didn’t do.

He was again face to face with the judge by morning.  She was, needless to say, not amused and not particularly sympathetic either when Sam Israel told the court that after his fake suicide on the bridge, he’d really tried to kill himself while on the run. He claimed he’d swallowed a bottle-full of morphine pills the night before turning himself in... another suicide attempt apparently gone awry.

Intelisano: The story seems to get crazier every day and every time you don’t think he can top himself, he tends to do something that is even more outrageous.

And as Sam Israel began serving his 20 years behind bars, federal officials revealed this final detail about his time on the lam:  Sam’s mother, Ann Israel, had helped orchestrate his surrender.

Apparently she’d been talking to the Feds and talking to Sam. He was reportedly on the phone with her as he walked into Southwick PD.

This final irony was lost on few people following the story:  That Sam Israel may have been a Wall Street huckster and a convicted felon, but in the end at least, he listened to his mother.  Who surely knew best...

Seigesmund: It was just stupid. And I am delighted that he will serve the next 20 years in a federal prison.

Sam Israel’s adventure in the New Gilded Age is over. From the House of Trump, to the House of Detention.

It looks like there will be restitution for investors like John Seigesmund who lost their money with Bayou. They could get up to half of their original investment back.

Bayou accountant Dan Marino is appealing his 20-year sentence.

And Sam Israel is awaiting trial on new flight charges. If convicted, he could get 10 more years added to his prison sentence.

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