Texas refused to pay lottery winner over $80 million dollars after she won a jackpot

[emeryjre]

Texas tried to change the rules after woman won $83 Million Dollar Jackpot

Had to file a lawsuit to get her payout

She finally got the payout 6 months after winning

MSN

 

[DrQ]

Just look at our Attorney General and you will understand.

 

[Brett]

Just look at our Attorney General and you will understand.

a comprehensive wikipedia page

 

[gravityrules]

There is a backstory, here is a timeline of events.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/projects/2025/texas-lottery-scandal-timeline/

But that story is not as well suited to MSN click bait.

 

[Brett]

There is a backstory, here is a timeline of events.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/projects/2025/texas-lottery-scandal-timeline/

But that story is not as well suited to MSN click bait.

Not sure that's a "backstory" to the same Texas lottery but perhaps a different disputed $95 MillionTexas lottery discussed here:
https://tugbbs.com/forums/threads/h...ion-legally-clever-or-ethically-shady.373417/

what is it about litigious Texas lotteries ?

 

[emeryjre]

Not the same story

The woman who won the lottery and had her payout held up is a story worthy of MSN

The fact she had to file a lawsuit as the Texas regulators couldn't find their butts with both hands

Makes interesting reading

If you think it is clickbait, you are welcome to scroll on by

 

[gravityrules]

Not the same story

The woman who won the lottery and had her payout held up is a story worthy of MSN

The fact she had to file a lawsuit as the Texas regulators couldn't find their butts with both hands

Makes interesting reading

If you think it is clickbait, you are welcome to scroll on by

If you had read through the timeline you would understand the connection. This event is specifically mentioned.

Whether she 'had to' file a lawsuit is an interpretation, but who wouldn't with so much at stake.

 

[emeryjre]

The article is behind a paywall
Tough to read

 

[dioxide45]

So this thread is just a bunch of hearsay? Why not post a link, or if the article is behind a paywall find one that isn't?

 

[DrQ]

The two articles are related:

1. A gambling consortium saw that the Texas Lottery was ripe for the taking and they used electronic purchasing of lottery tickets to purchase them fast enough to make the plan work.
2. The "Good Ol' Boys" in Austin got embarrassed and decided to outlaw agent sales of lottery tickets without passing any additional laws. (This caused the delay of the payout of a legitimate winner, but the ticket was purchased through an agent - which was legal at the time)

 

[TolmiePeak]

The two articles are related:

1. A gambling consortium saw that the Texas Lottery was ripe for the taking and they used electronic purchasing of lottery tickets to purchase them fast enough to make the plan work.
2. The "Good Ol' Boys" in Austin got embarrassed and decided to outlaw agent sales of lottery tickets without passing any additional laws.

There was no need to change any laws. They can modify their own internal procedures on who can sell lottery tickets at any time without new laws.

 

[DrQ]

There was no need to change any laws. They can modify their own internal procedures on who can sell lottery tickets at any time without new laws.

But they refused to honor a ticket sold before they changed the rules.

 

[TolmiePeak]

But they refused to honor a ticket sold before they changed the rules.

Yes. Pretty low class behavior. They got embarrassed and then tried to respond by screwing someone over to save face. I don't understand it. Don't they realize this makes them look worse than they did already? When you find yourself in a hole the first rule should be to stop digging.

 

[DrQ]

When you find yourself in a hole the first rule should be to stop digging.

West Texas is full of old holes that are leaking:

• Salt water
• Methane
• Oil
• Other assorted yuck

It's SNAFU and doesn't keep them from digging more.

 

[emeryjre]

So this thread is just a bunch of hearsay? Why not post a link, or if the article is behind a paywall find one that isn't?

The link in the first post works fine

If you go back to the first post and read the article you will be up to speed

The second link from a Houston paper is behind a paywall

 

[dioxide45]

The link in the first post works fine

If you go back to the first post and read the article you will be up to speed

The second link from a Houston paper is behind a paywall

Okay. sorry, I didn't see that. I wasn't expecting a small bit of text (three letters) to contain the link. I didn't even see it. It seems that MSN links do this when they are pasted. Bizarre as most others unfurl like this;

Texas Lottery to pay winner of $83.5M jackpot after withholding prize for months

The agency initially blocked the payout because of two state investigations into now-banned lottery courier services, one of which sold the winning ticket.

www.texastribune.org

 

[emeryjre]

I am seldom searching for Texas News
So the Texas Tribune does not hit my radar as a source for stories
But it certainly is not behind a paywall
I will keep it handy if there is a next time

 

[dioxide45]

I am seldom searching for Texas News
So the Texas Tribune does not hit my radar as a source for stories
But it certainly is not behind a paywall
I will keep it handy if there is a next time

That Texas Tribune story is what came up as the first result in a Google search of the thread title.

 

[WorldT]

There are two parts to the story.

Part 1
A gambler with some deep pockets out of Malta (?) wanted to win the Texas lottery by buying tickets with all the possible combinations. This is not illegal. However, the process of buying the very, very large number of lottery tickets needed to accomplish this is very cumbersome and very difficult to accomplish during the 3 (?) day span needed before the drawing. They did a couple of things to achieve their aim and they were ultimately successful. However, the things they did and how the lottery commission officials handled the process, and the after drawing review are currently being investigated at both the state and likely federal levels.
One of the things they did included the use of a "courier company". Essentially a middle man. This was very legal back then.
After this winning happened, there was some uproar about how everything went down, so everyone started an investigation.

Part 2
As these investigations were going on, a single lottery player unaffiliated with anything or anyone in Part 1 above used a courier company (still legal) to buy a ticket. The player won the over $80 million amount the OP posted. The commission investigated and concluded this was a lone individual and nothing else happened. But because a courier company was used (again still legal at that time) they decided we are not going to pay out until?? They didn't really specify what they were waiting for that was related to what this individual did. Essentially, they were trying to make using a courier illegal after the fact. The individual sued and won. It was not that difficult.

You will hear other lawsuits related to the Texas lottery. This will be related to part 1 and not part 2.

 

[emeryjre]

That Texas Tribune story is what came up as the first result in a Google search of the thread title.

I don't use Google
I use Bing
I earn Microsoft rewards points
I earn about $10 dollars worth a month
I donate these points to a Christian Ministry in the Dominican Republic
They provide education and family care
Bing gives me articles that have the little MSN as a link
Small price to pay for trying to help some really underprivileged individuals

About Microsoft Rewards

As a member of the Microsoft Rewards program, you can earn Rewards points for gift cards from favorite brands, sweepstakes entries, and more.

www.microsoft.com

 

[DrQ]

Part 1
A gambler with some deep pockets out of Malta (?) wanted to win the Texas lottery by buying tickets with all the possible combinations. This is not illegal. However, the process of buying the very, very large number of lottery tickets needed to accomplish this is very cumbersome and very difficult to accomplish during the 3 (?) day span needed before the drawing. They did a couple of things to achieve their aim and they were ultimately successful. However, the things they did and how the lottery commission officials handled the process, and the after drawing review are currently being investigated at both the state and likely federal levels.
One of the things they did included the use of a "courier company". Essentially a middle man. This was very legal back then.
After this winning happened, there was some uproar about how everything went down, so everyone started an investigation.

Here's the thing: The Texas Lottery got their cut of the money for the tickets that DIDN'T win. If they are losing money on a case where all the combinations are sold, then the lottery is not sustainable. That is not the players fault. Blame the game, not the players.

 

[emeryjre]

The Texas Lottery people refused to pay a winning ticket
The purchaser of the ticket did it in a perfectly legal manner
She was forced to take her claim to court to get the State of Texas to live up to their own rules
Shame on the State of Texas

 

[dioxide45]

Where would the money go if it wasn't paid out?

Here is where lottery revenue goes to in Texas.

Texas​

• Foundation School Fund
• Multicategorical Teaching Hospital
• Texas Veterans Commission (Veterans Assistance Fund)

Do you not care about schools and veterans?

 

[emeryjre]

If they don’t live up to their own rules
They will have zero funds for Veterans
People have plenty of other choices when it comes to gambling and lotteries

 

[davidvel]

Here's the thing: The Texas Lottery got their cut of the money for the tickets that DIDN'T win. If they are losing money on a case where all the combinations are sold, then the lottery is not sustainable. That is not the players fault. Blame the game, not the players.

Where would the money go if it wasn't paid out?

Here is where lottery revenue goes to in Texas.

Texas​

• Foundation School Fund
• Multicategorical Teaching Hospital
• Texas Veterans Commission (Veterans Assistance Fund)

Do you not care about schools and veterans?

This is incorrect. The lottery does not lose money in this scenario or any other (unless some state has a guaranteed win vs. parimutuel.) A lottery takes a percentage (usually around 50%), and uses it how the law provides. This percentage is of all tickets bought for that draw, nothing to do with if the tickets win or lose. The remainder (50%) is paid out as the law provides.

Had they not paid out (in either case), they would not keep all the money from tickets bought. No way the law allows this, IMO.

They could either:
- exclude the "violating" ticket and pay it out as though that ticket was never bought,
- roll it over (seems unfair to everyone in the original draw),
or some other method as the law allows.

As for whether any of these groups "benefit," it depends on the state. In CA after it first started the lottery (with net proceeds going to schools), somehow the allocations from the state to schools dropped the next year almost equally to the amount the lottery was projected to raise for schools. What a coincidence, eh?

The we are going to allocate this to XYZ is just to pull on voters heart strings to get them to vote yes, just like they say the new tax is for roads or firefighters, but it either goes in the general fund or prior allocations coincidentally reduce in the amount the new tax raises for those things.