Navigation

Scott Rothstein Deposition Overview

Eight days worth of transcripts from Scott Rothstein's Miami deposition have been released, and he's covered a wide range of topics while investment firms try to recover some of the money they lost in Rothstein's mega-Ponzi.He's been prohibited by the feds from going into too much detail on some topics...
Share this:

Eight days worth of transcripts from Scott Rothstein's Miami deposition have been released, and he's covered a wide range of topics while investment firms try to recover some of the money they lost in Rothstein's mega-Ponzi.

He's been prohibited by the feds from going into too much detail on some topics -- like most of his claims of bribing law enforcement and judges -- but he's also released many details the public has never heard before.

After the jump, check out what Rothstein was talking about during the first eight days of his deposition, which started on December 12:


A running catalog of all the transcripts from Rothstein's deposition, provided by Fort Lauderdale law firm Conrad & Scherer.


On day one, Rothstein took to ratting out some of his old lawyer pals, including Stuart Rosenfeldt, Russell Adler, and seven others.


Rothstein claims his friend Ted Morse was making money off of deals he set up and claimed Morse knew "very, very quickly... that they were not legitimate deals." Rothstein also covered their "man law account" -- which he claimed was used for "paying for our extracurricular activities with escorts."


On a scale of one to ten, Rothstein says the importance of TD Bank in furthering his scheme ranked as a ten. He goes into some detail about how the bank was so important and also offers some details on his trip to Morocco during the explosion of his Ponzi scheme.


On December 16, it was made clear Rothstein wasn't allowed to talk about several things, as Assistant U.S. District Attorney Lawrence LaVecchio objected to Rothstein's answering a handful of questions based on the "government's investigatory privilege." Those objections prevented Rothstein from answering questions about his associations with organized crime and claims that he bribed cops and judges.


Not exactly as damning as it is entertaining, Rothstein claimed that the Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler law firm was full of potheads. Rothstein claimed he didn't use any drugs except marijuana every now and then, but as for the attorneys in his office, that was a different story.


There are still more questions than answers about the murder of Melissa Britt Lewis. Rothstein didn't hand over a smoking gun, but he did provide a bit of insight about some of the circumstances surrounding their relationship.


Amid the dissemination of the transcripts from Rothstein's deposition, the Fort Lauderdale Police Department released a statement claiming none of the department's employees will be facing charges -- that it knows of.


Once an attorney for TD Bank got his turn to question Rothstein, he wanted to know what's up between Rothstein and the feds and clarified a few specific things to be sure Rothstein wasn't allowed to shell out the details.


The same attorney questioning Rothstein about his relationship with the feds, Mark Schnapp, accused Rothstein of lying throughout the deposition. If Rothstein can lie his way to a billion bucks, Schnapp was pretty sure Rothstein could lie his way to getting a few years off of his sentence for ratting folks out.


With the constant accusations flying in that Rothstein's just lying through that deposition and the accusation from TD Bank's attorney, we put the question to the readers. Just over 51 percent say he's telling the truth, while just over 48 percent say he's lying.


New Times on Facebook | The Pulp on Facebook | Matthew Hendley on Facebook | Twitter | E-mail Matthew Hendley |

BEFORE YOU GO...
Can you help us continue to share our stories? Since the beginning New Times Broward-Palm Beach has been defined as the free, independent voice of South Florida — and we'd like to keep it that way. Our members allow us to continue offering readers access to our incisive coverage of local news, food, and culture with no paywalls.