Florida Lawyer Scott Rothstein Sentenced to 50 Years for $1 billion Ponzi Scheme

Florida Lawyer Scott Rothstein was sentenced to 50 years in prison. The federal prosecutors suggested only 40 years, but Rothstein pleaded guilty to racketeering and fraud conspiracy and was sentenced to 50 years.

Now, that's a long time to be sitting in the "jug". I doubt that Rothstein will ever do anything like this again. If he lives this sentence through, he'll be 99 years old when he gets out according to his sentence and his age, I doubt that he will have enough time left in his life to regain his reputation.

The 48 year old Rothstein initially fled to Morocco after his ponzi scheme collapsed in October 2009. Monacco has no extradition treaty with the United States. Somehow he came to his senses and voluntarily came back to the US last year in November.

"For the first time in five years I was completely honest about what I had done and who I was," Rothstein wrote last week to James Cohn, his judge, as an explanation.

Based on court documents Rothstein acted with co-conspirators to carry out the $1.2 billion scheme. He created false bank documents and lured investors into investing their money into his scheme. As Rothstein was very cooperative with the investigators, he only received a 50 year sentence, opposed to a possible sentence of 100 years.

"It was all about influence, wealth power and influence," Judge James Cohn said, "an opulent lifestyle funded by stolen money". "This Ponzi scheme was not the result of a poor business decision. Quite the contrary, it was fraud at its inception," Cohn said.

The Sun-Sentinel said Rothstein "appeared visibly and dramatically changed by his six months in federal custody, much thinner with closely shorn gray hair and a goatee." As per the Sun-Sentinel, Cohn noted that in his former life, "Mr. Rothstein was seemingly omnipotent. He was everywhere. He was not only everywhere, but everywhere with excesses," and the judge condemned Rothstein for forging federal court orders to carry out one aspect of his fraud. "These actions constituted the most egregious wrong a licensed attorney can commit. There can be no conduct more reviled."

"I am truly and deeply sorry for what I have done. I don't expect your forgiveness. I don't," Rothstein said. "I am ashamed and embarrassed."

"For those that are entrusted with other people's money: Do the right thing," John V. Gillies, the head of the FBI's Miami office said. "For those that entrust people with their money: Don't be fooled by the promise of unrealistic returns. The common element for both is greed — don't let it get the best of you."

Scott W. Rothstein  was born on June 10, 1962 and is a disbarred lawyer and the former managing shareholder, chairman, and chief executive officer of the now-defunct Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler law firm.

As ABC News puts it:
"Rothstein rose from blue-collar roots in the Bronx to the society pages of South Florida".

Or at least he did so for a short time. The whole story shows that it is much better to be decent and trustworthy. Crime does not pay, at least not in the long run.