Steward Health Care CEO Ralph de la Torre and his top deputy jetted last summer to Jamaica for an escape from the scorching heat in Dallas. Among the worries they left behind: the unpaid bills that were piling up at headquarters. They stepped off the company's private plane and onto de la Torre's personal yacht, bound for a weeklong cruise through the Caribbean. They followed that trip with a few days back in the office. And then de la Torre headed to the Virgin Islands on another break. And then another — and another. Jamaica, Antigua, St. Kitts, Bermuda, Turks and Caicos. In all, the CEO spent 34 days in the tropics — plus a long weekend in the French Riviera — last summer as his healthcare company teetered on the brink of bankruptcy, according to a new Globe Spotlight Team analysis of public flight records, yacht records, internal company documents, and interviews with people close to the matter. Nearly half of the 582 flights flown in 2022 and 2023 were to or from destinations more than 100 miles away from any official Steward location, such as hospitals or corporate offices. Passengers included de la Torre's fishing friends, a luxury yacht salesman, and high-profile horse trainers. De la Torre flew to Massachusetts — the birthplace of his company and then home of eight of its hospitals — just seven times in two years, records show. Each trip lasted a day or less. In many, if not all, instances, the private jet excursions were paid for by Steward, records show, the funds pulled directly from the coffers of one of the nation's largest — and most troubled — for-profit, private hospital chains.
