NOT THE SHARPEST KNIFE IN THE DRAWER: The Perfect Getaway Vehicle?
Most people buy RVs to get away from it all. Fugitive financier Samuel Israel III, 48, bought a 31-foot 2007 Coachmen Freelander for a getaway on the day he was supposed to surrender to authorities to begin a 20-year sentence for defrauding Bayou Management hedge fund investors. He apparently wanted a life of luxury while on the lam, reports The Washington Post’s David Segal:
[I]f your first priority is eluding a nationwide manhunt, skedaddling in a 14,500-pound house on wheels - with a queen-size bed, a fridge, a shower, a 50-gallon fresh water tank and a furnace - seems pretty dumb.
Seriously, was J-Lo's tour bus booked? Why not just skyjack the Goodyear blimp and flash "Suckers!" on the side? …
But living in “a house on wheels” has its advantages while trying to elude capture:
“It's not a bad move,” says Donald Smith, a sales manager at McCord's RV Center in Longview, Wash. … “He's got every convenience known to man - a shower, a kitchen, a TV, so he'll be able to keep tabs on what the media is saying about him. … If he's careful, he can stay put just about anywhere for two weeks, maybe more. His hot water will run off a 12-volt battery.” …
But conspicuous consumption is not the way to go in this situation, according to others:
Marvin Lutes, a retired marshal and president of the U.S. Marshals Service Association, was full of advice. Which boils down to “run, Sammy, run.”
“He should get rid of the RV," Lutes said. "Leave it in the woods, dump it in a lake. Then head to Canada.”
The WaPo notes that “Israel is not the first criminal to find the RV irresistible,” citing a group of prison escapees known as the Texas Seven who pretended to be Christian missionaries while holed up in an RV at a motor-home park in CO 2001 and one Bobby Shamburger “who'd fleeced investors in his insurance company of $200 million and then high-tailed it to Phoenix, where he re-christened himself Jim Tyler.”
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