This article has some great stories of people who fake their death but then get busted. This one is my favorite.
In New Port Richey, Florida, a woman named Alison Matera told her friends, family, and church choir that she had cancer, and only months to live. She went into hospice, and soon the community was notified of her death. Yet Matera was quite alive; her plan unraveled when she appeared at her own funeral service, claiming to be her own long-lost identical twin sister. She was recognized, and when police were called she admitted to faking both her cancer and death.
