Sometimes it’s not easy to recognize deceit, but then that’s the nature of deceit—to fool unsuspecting victims. In Alan Sakowitz’s Miles Away…Worlds Apart: Empowering Lessons Gleaned from Experiences of a Whistleblower, the author reveals how one man made a conscious choice to lie, cheat, and deceive innocent “friends”—all for the almighty dollar, and how a community of people made honorable choices and decisions amidst, and in spite of, this man’s dishonesty.
Essentially, Scott Rothstein imbued his world with distrust and deceit en route to orchestrating the largest scam—to the tune of $1.2 Billion—in South Florida history. On the other hand, Sakowitz contrasts Rothstein with the generosity and humanity evident in his own community. Ultimately, the author writes this book to convey how two different worlds can exist side-by-side, with values that are diametrically opposed.
Upon examining Scott Rothstein’s lifestyle, it would be an understatement to describe it as lavish. In addition to owning twenty-one luxury cars, including a Bentley Rolls Royce and many others, Rothstein “leased a jet and bought a $5,000,000 Warren yacht… He bought a mansion and then bought the other houses on the same street. He invested in business after business.”
Essentially, Scott Rothstein imbued his world with distrust and deceit en route to orchestrating the largest scam—to the tune of $1.2 Billion—in South Florida history. On the other hand, Sakowitz contrasts Rothstein with the generosity and humanity evident in his own community. Ultimately, the author writes this book to convey how two different worlds can exist side-by-side, with values that are diametrically opposed.
Upon examining Scott Rothstein’s lifestyle, it would be an understatement to describe it as lavish. In addition to owning twenty-one luxury cars, including a Bentley Rolls Royce and many others, Rothstein “leased a jet and bought a $5,000,000 Warren yacht… He bought a mansion and then bought the other houses on the same street. He invested in business after business.”
Rothstein lived like a king—at the expense of the hard-earned savings of his investors. His flamboyant lifestyle brought him a fitting jail sentence: fifty years. Scott Rothstein, and many before him (e.g., Bernie Madoff) allowed greed and temptation to blind them to the consequences that were waiting at the end of the road.
Alan Sakowitz, in Miles Away . . . Worlds Apart, essentially provides a blueprint for making choices and the outcomes that can result from the paths we choose. In this important book, the reader can easily see that the choices we make determine our quality of life relative to what is truly important in life.
Alan Sakowitz portrays a genuine, unadulterated kindness and concern for humanity via the actions of his community, located only miles away from Scott Rothstein’s world of greed. From Coach Bugay—the ideal role model for little league children—to Sheila, a fire victim from the North Miami neighborhood that adopted a selfless, all-for-one mindset.
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