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.