Anyone remember John Stonehouse?
Was a Government Minister in the 70's who faked his death via drowning & ran away to Australia under a new name with his mistress.
It eventually came out on top, though when he was first arrested the Australian police thought he was Lord Lucan (another great news story) who had disappeared just 2 weeks earlier.
He was deported back to the UK, but astonishingly, he never initially resigned his seat in the House of Commons.
Eventually he was charged with a range of frauds, as well as spying for the Czech Republic as it then was, and at his Trial he conducted his own defence in comical fashion, & was sent to Prison for 7 years.
I sometimes think Stonehouse was the inspiration for the Reginald Perrin TV series with Leonard Rossiter.
From the Wikipedia page on said series
At the end of the first series, Reggie fakes suicide by leaving his clothes on a beach in West Bay, Dorset and running into the sea. Coincidentally, MP John Stonehouse faked his own death in this manner shortly before the book was published, although neither was inspired by the other; the novel was written before Stonehouse's faked suicide in November 1974, but not published until 1975. The phrase "do a Reggie Perrin" did enter the vernacular, however, assisted by the Stonehouse affair.
The canoe guy from Seaton Carew nor Hartlepool who turned up in Panama may have been inspired by one or both
