Bayou hedge fund manager believed to fake suicide: report

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Samuel Israel III, the U.S. hedge fund manager convicted of fraud, is now on the run after failing to report to prison to begin serving a 20-year sentence, ABC News reported on its website on Friday.

Unnamed U.S. Marshals and New York State Police investigators told the U.S. television network they are almost certain the disgraced hedge fund manager faked a suicide plunge earlier this week.

Israel was convicted of bilking investors out of some $400 million through his failed Bayou Group hedge fund. His car was found the Bear Mountain Bridge earlier this week with the words "suicide is painless" written in the dust on the hood.

Authorities initially suspected Israel jumped off the bridge in a possible suicide, but no body has been found and no witnesses reported seeing him jump, the website said.

Israel was sentenced to 20 years in prison in April after he pleaded guilty in September 2005 to charges of conspiracy and fraud over eight years through Bayou Group.

(Reporting by Dane Hamilton and Paritosh Bansal, editing by Leslie Gevirtz)