Stamford Advocate – Debra Ryan, the girlfriend of Samuel Israel, convicted for his role in a $400 million fraud involving the collapse of Stamford-based hedge-fund firm Bayou Group LLC, was sentenced to three years probation for aiding his escape.
Ryan, a decorator who once rented a house on Highland Avenue in Greenwich, also was ordered to be confined at home for four months and not to have any contact with Israel.
Israel, 49, pleaded guilty in March to faking his suicide by abandoning his car on the Bear Mountain bridge with the words "suicide is painless" written on the windshield and fleeing the day he was to begin a 20-year sentence. He pleaded guilty to fraud in 2005 after admitting he hid $400 million in losses at Bayou.
