There's a lot of talk here on LP about hiring financial planners, CPAs, lawyers.......
Yes, and....?
Several books about coming into some serious money suggest the person who gets it should get Kidnap and Ransom insurance
I haven't read these unnamed books, but from your short synopsis of them I'd say they were being overly alarmist if not melodramatic. As far as I know, there have been just three lottery-related kidnappings and subsequent deaths; the Thorne child in Australia, the Bryant and father incident in Illinois and Jeffery Dampier. There may be more and I'd like to read about them, so if you or anyone else knows of other incidents, please link me.
That said, insurance is hardly ever a bad idea; if I ever win, I will purchase umbrella insurance, just in case someone "trips on a crack" in the sidewalk in front of my house and sues the pee-waddin' outta me. (and in that case, anonymity will not help you; the plaintiff's lawyers will soon find out - down to your last dime - how much money you have. Granted, anonymity would most likely protect you from frivolous lawsuits or "scripted accidents". I will also have a lot of my money in trusts, prob. irrevocable ones that cannot be seized to pay off a judgement. That will be a hassle, but unlike many others I would not mind a little hassle to protect my lottery winnings.)
Dampier was murdered by his sister-in-law nearly ten yrs. after he won. Anonymity wouldn't have helped him, but I reckon having a better sister-in-law would have.
The Bryant kidnapping ransom demand was for a - to me, at least - pitifully small amount, $25k from a win of less than a half million. I don't know any more particulars about that case, so I can't say one way or the other that the publicity directly led to the kidnapping and subsequent death of the son.
The Thorne kidnapping and murder happened a half century ago and half the world away, so it's practically ancient history. I will admit that anonymity probably could have saved the child's life, but I'd also insist that a little common sense on the part of the parents would have prevented his death, namely not to let their kid walk to school on his own with a huge bullseye on the back of his school uniform. I know I'm being a little harsh, but I don't mind being harsh on anyone who wants to win the lottery yet thinks they should not have to make common sense adjustments to their lifestyle.
Still, three cases out of how many winners there have ever been since lotteries first started being played? (I once tried to find the grand total of lottery winners but failed) It has to be a tiny percentage and as I pointed out, Dampier having anonymity would not have helped him. The Thorne incident was in Australia, so that leaves the grand total of two kidnappings here in the U.S. and the lack of anonymity had nothing to do with one, so... Yeah, a HUGE risk. <snicker>
As for 'transparency'.........Iowa, Tipton, how'd that work out? They caught him after how long?
How'd that work out? For Tipton or for trust in the lottery? For the argument for transparency or that of anonymity? They caught him after how long? I don't know; I am aware of the case but I never memorized the timeline. You wanna make your case with me, you'll need to put forth the answers to your own rhetorical questions.
From this article of a few yrs. back with an alarmist headline: Lottery winners risk death and danger after going public (at least they did proper journalism and presented both sides of the argument, the headline notwithstanding)
Anonymity enables lottery-fixing
Critics complain that allowing winners to hide their identity is a convenient way to conceal criminal activity.
Anonymity "throws a layer of assistance to someone who wants to rig a drawing," said Dan Russell, former attorney for the Florida Lottery and now a private-practice attorney representing major casinos and gambling industry manufacturers. "It is of no value to those of us who want the system to operate in a clean manner. That is absolutely the wrong idea."
The risk of anonymous winners came to light after a lottery insider fixed numbers in several games over several years.
Iowa prosecutors say a computer expert working for the Multi-State Lottery Association, or MUSL, which runs games for 37 member states and U.S. territories, figured out how to rig number-generating computers to pick his set of numbers.
Authorities believe Eddie Tipton and his associates successfully cashed in tickets in Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma and Wisconsin, netting more than $2.6 million in payouts.
Tipton was convicted of fraud in July for attempting to claim a $16.5 million Hot Lotto jackpot in Iowa. He faces charges additional charges in Iowa related to the other four states.
The requirement that names be made public was "the layer of security he couldn't break," Iowa Lottery CEO Terry Rich said.
Gary Grief, chairman of the Powerball committee for MUSL, insists he has complete confidence in the integrity of the time-tested ball-drawing system, and he still supports revealing winners' names.
Name disclosure is "a positive thing to reinforce to players that real people do win and that those real people don't work for the lottery or aren't involved with lottery," he said.
A Powerball-type game has not had a high-profile scandal since 1980, the year of the so-called "triple six fix," in which a lottery insider and others secretly weighted balls with paint so only a few combinations of numbers could surface in the Pennsylvania Daily Number game.
The seven men bet heavily on those combinations. The winning number was 666, which yielded $1.8 million. But they were caught, prosecuted and most of the money was recovered.
"The worst thing that could ever happen to the lottery," McNay said, "is people feeling like it's fixed."
I could use analogies about transparency in govt. but I really don't want to bring in politics, even though I would be an equal opportunity accuser towards both parties in power in regards to their abuse of secrecy. The public trust in anything to do with the govt. is what is important; confidence is paramount, be it with our President or with the lottery. The town close to where I live had closed city council meetings about the controversy over the mayor having his alley paved by the street dept. and the county where I grew up also held closed commissioner meetings when it was found the county roads dept. had been maintaining wealthy rancher's private roads. Both of those cases were swept under the rug and allowing transparency in what went on in those meetings might have at least shed some light on the scandals.
But, once again, I will repeat until it (hopefully)sinks in; my argument is not that anonymity would not provide an extra layer of security for the winner because I'm sure it would, at least that from "danger from strangers", but that:
1. Anonymity won't protect you from your family.
2. I honestly believe the publicity of a win helps to ramp up interest in playing and to drive sales.
3. Griping about your state not having anonymity on a lottery forum will do NOTHING. Again, you need to direct your time and efforts towards convincing your state representative to change your lottery law.