LSB compliant init script that actually works. Tested on Linux Mint 15 and CentOS 6.5.

init_script.sh

#!/bin/bash
#
# chkconfig: 2345 90 12
# description: Description of service here
#
### BEGIN INIT INFO
# Provides:          Short service name here
# Required-Start:    $remote_fs $network $syslog
# Required-Stop:     $remote_fs $network $syslog
# Default-Start:     3 5
# Default-Stop:      0 1 6
# Short-Description: 
# Description:       
### END INIT INFO

. /lib/lsb/init-functions

SERVICE=Short service name here
DAEMON=Full path to service script or executable here
PIDFILE=/var/run/${SERVICE}.pid
LOGFILE=/logs/${SERVICE}.log
# time to wait before checking for a successful start
STARTWAIT=.2s

showLogFile() {
  echo "Log file ${LOGFILE} says:"
  tail ${LOGFILE}
}

start() {
  PID=`pidofproc -p $PIDFILE`
  if [[ $? -eq 0 ]]; then
    log_warning_msg "$SERVICE is already running."
    exit
  fi
  ${DAEMON} >> $LOGFILE 2>&1 &
  PID=$!

  if [[ ! "${PID}" ]]; then
    log_failure_msg "Unable to start $SERVICE"
    showLogFile
    exit 1
  fi
  
  echo ${PID} > ${PIDFILE}
  sleep ${STARTWAIT}
  CHECK_PID=`pidofproc -p $PIDFILE`
  if [[ $? -eq 0 ]]; then
    log_success_msg "${SERVICE} server startup - pid $PID"
  else
    log_failure_msg "${SERVICE} did not start"
    showLogFile
    exit 1
  fi
}

stop() {
  PID=`pidofproc -p $PIDFILE`
  if [[ $? -ne 0 ]]; then
    echo "$SERVICE is not running."
    exit 1
  fi
  killproc -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON
  if [[ $? -eq 0 ]]; then
    log_success_msg "Stopped ${SERVICE}"
  else
    log_failure_msg "Failed to stop ${SERVICE}"
  fi
}

status() {
  PID=`pidofproc -p $PIDFILE`
  if [[ $? -eq 0 ]]; then
    echo "$SERVICE is running (${PID})."
  else
    echo "$SERVICE is not running."
  fi
}

case "$1" in
  start)
    start
    ;;
  stop)
    stop
    ;;
  status)
    status
    ;;
  restart|reload|condrestart)
    stop
    sleep .1s
    start
    ;;
  *)
    echo $"Usage: $0 {start|stop|restart|reload|status}"
    exit 1
esac
exit 0