Call this Scott Rothstein's pineapple-juice scam.

Coconut Grove businessman Todd Snyder was lured into it just days before the Fort Lauderdale lawyer's Ponzi scheme imploded in late October. Snyder wired a bank more than $2 million to buy a slice of Rothstein's purported $500 million settlement with Dole Food Co.

But Snyder soon learned there would be no fabulous returns. Rothstein had fled to Morocco, leaving him and hundreds of other South Florida investment victims with empty bank accounts.

``I never met Rothstein, I never spoke with him,'' Snyder, 40, told The Miami Herald. ``I didn't even know who he was.''

Rothstein, 47, says he never heard of Snyder, either.

``I keep seeing names on the Internet who were alleged investors of me and I have no idea who they are,'' Rothstein told The Herald on Thursday. ``There are sublayers of people doing very, very bad things to people in my name, so we shall see.''

``Not that I didn't do something wrong, and I'm back here to fix it,'' he said. ``I made a decision to come back from Morocco and do the right thing. I know people are laughing and saying he can't repay these people, and they are wrong.''

Snyder, who on Thursday sued Rothstein, his law firm and Toronto Dominion Bank in federal court, said he hooked up with Rothstein through friend Doug Faulkner, a stock broker whom Snyder had met about a year ago.

Snyder is the owner of Tech-Optics, a Miami company that recycles and sells toner cartridges and does an annual business of more than $30 million, he said.

Snyder said that several months ago, he had invested about $850,000 in stocks with Faulkner, now a broker at Jesup and Lamont. He made about $15,000 in profits, so he trusted Faulkner.

Then, about a month ago, Faulkner brought him a new deal. He explained it at a U2 concert the men attended with their wives.

``He made the pitch there,'' Snyder recounted. ``He said this is a great investment, you've got to invest.''

The deal offered a return of eight percent per month for the following four months. It involved a purported lawsuit against California-based Dole, which Faulkner said had settled for $500 million in the face of accusations that it had overstated the percentage of pineapple in juices it sold to school districts.

A Dole Food spokesman told The Herald that the purported lawsuit settlement was ``a total fabrication.''

Rothstein is under federal investigation for an investment scheme that could reach $1 billion. He has not been charged, but is suspected of fabricating legal settlements and selling them to investors at a discount in return for receiving the full payoffs a few months later.

INCREDULITY FAILS

In Snyder's case, Faulkner told him that Rothstein was a ``high-powered attorney'' and that previous investors had been paid their profits, Snyder recounted.

Snyder said he asked Faulkner lots of questions, and he had answers for all.

``I said, `Why isn't everybody doing this?' He said, `[Rothstein] doesn't allow everyone into this deal.' ''

He also asked: If Rothstein was such a successful lawyer, why would he need other investors instead of just financing the deal himself?

The answer from Faulkner: It would be unethical for Rothstein since he was the lawyer handling the settlement.

``I asked him 10 times, `Is this a Ponzi scheme? Is this a Ponzi scheme?' And he said no,'' Snyder said. ``I talked to my Merrill Lynch broker, and the broker said this is not a legitimate deal. I did it anyway because I trusted [Faulkner].''