Families in Illinois were furious when the state refused to pay their lottery wins. The state declined to pay out a stunning $288 million in wins, according to Tom Zimmerman, an attorney who represented some of the winners.
The state of Illinois declared that it will not pay out any winners exceeding $600 until a fiscal situation is overcome. Nevertheless, lottery advertisements on television continued to appear. If any private corporation engaged in this type of activity, selling tickets and failing to pay up the winner, the state would shut them down and charge them with fraud, Zimmerman said.
Rhonda Rasche, a 49-year-old hospital clerk, stated that after winning a $50,000 scratch-off ticket, authorities assured her she would get a cheque in the mail in four to six weeks. However, she had not been paid for months. She “I’ve been waiting for a $50,000 cheque, she explained. Rasche is one of the lottery winners who sued the state to collect their money.
Susan Rick, an outraged lottery winner, told them they won. They can now live comfortably. They had a $250,000 ticket.
Likewise, a group of Chicago city employees entered a lottery pool and won $1 million, but they didn’t see a dollar of it. They also sued the state of Illinois.
Payment delays will happen since the Illinois Comptroller or the Illinois Lottery currently lack legal power to issue checks. Please keep in mind that while the funds to pay winners is available, the legal power to issue checks is not, the Illinois Lottery stated in a statement.
The state of Illinois pledged to pay lottery winners after a budget was enacted, but this did little to calm down irate taxpayers who were handed nothing more than IOUs after winning riches. And anyone who is dissatisfied with the way the government handles things would be dubious.
‘Stuff like this makes me wish I didn’t live in Illinois,’ a humiliated individual wrote on social media. It’s difficult to disagree with that. As attorney Tom Zimmerman pointed out, if the state couldn’t pay lottery winners, they should have ceased selling tickets. Therefore, what they are doing amounts to fraud.
