If  the people who aren't smart enough to get out of jury duty are like most of the people here the players wouldn't need a lawyer. They'd just have to sue and wait for their handout. Fortunately we have judges to throw out the cases with no merit.

Are you saying in the eyes of LP members all lottery players are winners until proved other wise?  Well WTO and Congrats to all lottery players.

I'm saying that many people here would give money to anyone with a losing lottery ticket and a sob story about why they thought it was really a winning ticket.

  people who aren't smart enough to get out of jury duty

I always hear this expression and don't quite understand why it's so common.  Jury duty is, well....our "duty" isn't it?  Sometimes I've wondered if you're an attorney after reading some of your posts, but I hope that's not true.  I'd hate to think we have lawyers with such a negative viewpoint of people serving their communities.  Our justice system is far from perfect, but at least we have one where the people can participate in its process.  The Constitution of the United States guarantees us this right. 

Fortunately we have judges to throw out the cases with no merit.

True, but a lot of the judges shouldn't be on the bench in the first place. One flaw in our system is that it doesn't hold judges accountable for making bad decisions.  They throw out a lot of cases "with no merit" like the one where a woman pleaded for protection against her abusive husband and the judged mocked her.  Her husband later poured gasoline all over her and set her on fire. 

Well, this is a lottery board, so to stay on topic, yesterday I read that Mr. Curcio has hired an attorney.  I don't think he has a good case and agree that the ticket isn't valid. However, I also believe he has a right to challenge it.  The Lottery did agree to inspect the ticket more carefully and to check for possible alteration, but Mr. Curcio refused to turn it over to them.  As DD wrote before, this isn't over yet.  

At least give a consolation prize to the guy...They should take out insurance for this kind of events..

That's why i can't stand the lottery....

I think they should pay them.  If they don't then maybe they (the people of Florida) should boycott the lottery until they play fair.  Let's remember, if it  happened once then it will happen again and maybe next time it will happen to you.  This is under handed

If lotteries took out insurance to offer a consolation prize to every loser that thought he/she should have won, who do you think would pay for it?  Every loser gets a consolation prize, a losing ticket, but most players discard them.

The lotteries always say "You can't win if you don't play", maybe they should add "you can lose either" for those players who don't like to lose.

The Florida Lottery made an official announcement about this case on Friday.  I don't think I am allowed to post links to lottery sites, so go to the Florida Lottery web site and click on NEWS if you are interested. 

I haven't seen this before, and there have been many misprints, so apparently being a squeaky wheel makes a difference!

By the way, if you take a close look at the ticket, the number 1 doesn't look as if it's positioned correctly.  Who knows if he scratched off the number 3?  I'm not saying this is the case, but the Lottery (and the newspaper) said he refused to complete a formal claim and submit his ticket for an official inspection. Guess he doesn't trust them.  This is turning into a Law & Order episode where the suspect refuses to take a polygraph.  LOL 

Actually, I completely agree that jury duty is a civic responsibility that everybody should meet. Unfortunately the system is seriously flawed, and the reality is that most people want to avoid jury duty, and with good cause. The last time I had jury duty I was paid $40 a day. The good news is that I didn't have to pay taxes on it, but the bad news is that I had to drive there and pay for parking. Why on earth would I want to do that for a week (never mind getting on a case that lasts for two or three weeks or longer) instead of earning a normal income? If one of my fellow jurors had been a government employee earning 130k they would have been paid about $500 per day for doing the same job. Again, why should I work for less than 10% of what somebody else is paid to do the exact same job?

Then there's the matter of who will actually end up on the jury. If I answer truthfully I will probably never be acceptable to competent lawyers. I'm too smart, too inquisitive and too argumentative, and that generally isn't what lawyers look for in a juror. The ideal juror is somebody who can be persuaded to believe your point of view, and the smarter they are the harder that will be if you don't have a really good case. Of course, there's no such thing as a trial where both sides have a really good case. FWIW (and to bring it back on topic), plenty of lawyers will tell you that for a civil trial seeking damages for an injury, the ideal juror is a blue collar guy who plays the lottery. In the real world, juries often are composed of the people who couldn't escape jury duty. I'll freely admit that "too stupid to get out of jury duty" is a somewhat cynical view of the process, but there's a reason it's a cliche.

Unfortunately, judges aren't perfect either, and that's something that's hard to fix. If you make them too accountable you get judges that are fired for political reasons, and if they serve an elected term or for life you can't get rid if the ones who are bad judges. Of course, what a bad judge is often subject to personal feelings, and without knowing the facts about a case it's impossible to second guess a ruling. Just because an abusive husband later set her on fire doesn't mean the woman had a sound legal case for protection. If she didn't have proof that he was a real danger, his right to be left alone trumps her right to be protected by government interference in his life. It's part of that whole "innocent until proven guilty" thing.

As for the case at hand, until the lottery board gets to examine the ticket and issue a final ruling, they can't officially declare the ticket a loser, and therefore the guy has no case. Right now he's just working on spin for his side.

I must have been lucky because the company I worked for before I retired alway paid the regular salary of employees who serve the community.  They wouldn't pay for any overtime opportunity missed.  We had people looking for ways to serve the community on company time for the extra pay, even people who worked nights got paid if they were too tire to come to work after serving the community doing the day.  I only used the system once and that was when I drove 100 miles to Akron to serve on a Federal jury.  I've voted in every election and have never been asked to serve on a local jury and now that I'm retired I hope that doesn't change.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FRIDAY, MAY 18, 2007
 CONTACT: JACQUELINE BARREIROS
(850) 487-7727
WWW.FLALOTTERY.COM
 

STATEMENT BY THE FLORIDA LOTTERY REGARDING POSSIBLE MISPRINT OF GOLD RUSH TICKET

TALLAHASSEE -- On Monday, May 14, the Florida Lottery learned of a possible printing error on a Florida Lottery GOLD RUSH Scratch-Off ticket. The Florida Lottery is investigating the circumstances of the apparent misprint; however, without possession of the original ticket in question, the Lottery¿s investigation is limited. While preliminary analysis of a photocopy of the ticket seems to indicate that it is a non-winning ticket, a final determination cannot be reached until the player submits a formal claim along with the original ticket.

To safeguard the integrity of Florida Lottery games and to ensure that all valid claims are paid, the Lottery subscribes to standard procedures that must be followed by all persons claiming a prize. These procedures are in place to benefit and protect all of our customers.

Looks like this guy is going to have follow the rules same as any other players if he expects to collect anything.

 Just because an abusive husband later set her on fire doesn't mean the woman had a sound legal case for protection. If she didn't have proof that he was a real danger, his right to be left alone trumps her right to be protected by government interference in his life. It's part of that whole "innocent until proven guilty" thing.

I understand what you are saying.  Nobody should be able to go to court and simply ask for a restraining or no contact order without valid cause.  Believe me, this woman had just cause. I hope in your wildest imagination you don't honestly believe that any man suddenly wakes up one day and decides to set his wife on fire. That's like saying a man decided one day to become a pedophile.  It's usually not his first offense..he just hasn't been caught.  Do you know how many women and children are murdered because a judge decided a case wasn't serious enough?  Women shouldn't have to hide in shelters because a flawed system won't protect them.  In some way they are still considered to be property.  When is society going to begin looking at men (or women) who stalk or violently beat their spouses as criminals?  There's never any excuse for domestic violence.   By the way, I'm not a victim so that has nothing to do with this post.  If a man ever beat me up, that would be the last time he ever used his arms.  I will never understand why a woman (or man) stays in an abusive relationship.

As I said before, this is a lottery board, so I am trying to stay focused on the topic, since there have been complaints about rambling.  Nobody knows what really happened except the people who bought the ticket.  I'm reading different versions of the same story.

So let me get this straight. The FL lottery wants this guy to give them the ticket so they can "investigate" what went wrong and the guy walks away waiting to hear from them? I don't know about you, but if I was this guy, that ticket wouldn't be leaving my sight! Anything they want to do with the ticket, they can do with me standing right next to them. If this guy hands over the ticket and walks away expecting to hear from them, a week will go by without hearing from them, he'll call them up to see what's going on, and all the FL lottery is going to say "You never gave us the ticket".

"Looks like this guy is going to have follow the rules same as any other players if he expects to collect anything."

Everything we have heard so far has been from the ticket holder and his wife. They probably took the ticket to a gas station, had it scanned, were told it wasn't a winner, showed the clerk the "1" on the top row, the cherk showed them the "th" and were told by the clerk it was a misprint. In the CNN interview the man and his wife both made it a point to mention several times they should be paid because the "1" on the prize row matched the "1" on top row. In a close up he pointed to the "1" on the top while his finger conviently covered the "th" below.

I've never cashed a $500,000 winner, but everytime I've cashed a free ticket, I hand the ticket to the clerk, they scan it, pay me, and keep the ticket. According to the statement by the Florida Lottery, they have never seen the actual ticket.

Should they take his word and write a check or is the Florida Lottery being unreasonable by asking to see the ticket?

(1)  This happened in Florida

(2)  They are asking a prospective winner to hand the ticket to State employees for verification. 

(3)  Are these the same people who counted the votes in Palm Beach County in 2000?  LOL