Ontario Lottery apologizes for false winning tickets
Filed under: Ripoffs and Scams, Fraud
The Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation is apologizing to people who bought more than 1,100 lottery tickets that appeared to be big winners but were actually misprints.
TheStar.com reports that 50 to 150 $3 defective Fruit Smash lottery tickets were sold, making the tickets appear to be winners although they weren't supposed to be. The "winners" will not receive any cash because the law says that misprinted lottery tickets are null and void.
According to TheStar, one man who thought he had won $135,000 Canadian Dollars "had already made plans to move his family out of their basement apartment, send his children to college and live the life he had always dreamed about" by the time he found out that he wouldn't be getting any money. Ouch!
It's a cruel joke for the disappointed ticket buyers, but hopefully it will give lawmakers pause about the future of the lottery, especially since sales have been down lately in the U.S. This guy was living in a basement apartment and didn't have enough money to send his kids to college, but the province was still preying on his desire for a quick buck by selling him lottery tickets. Where is the moral outrage about that?
According to TheStar, one man who thought he had won $135,000 Canadian Dollars "had already made plans to move his family out of their basement apartment, send his children to college and live the life he had always dreamed about" by the time he found out that he wouldn't be getting any money. Ouch!
It's a cruel joke for the disappointed ticket buyers, but hopefully it will give lawmakers pause about the future of the lottery, especially since sales have been down lately in the U.S. This guy was living in a basement apartment and didn't have enough money to send his kids to college, but the province was still preying on his desire for a quick buck by selling him lottery tickets. Where is the moral outrage about that?
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Reader Comments (Page 2 of 9)
1-08-2009 @ 2:19PM
Ronaldo said...
I have a dream also.....crushed as it may be like this man's is. My dream is that people who can't afford to help with their kids college education, stop wasting their money on the Lottery. But that is just a dream.
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1-08-2009 @ 2:40PM
Donna said...
As a mother of a college student I can tell you that money spent on occassional lottery ticket is not gonna get in the way of tuition! nor is the few bucks saved from not playing gonna help any!!!!
1-08-2009 @ 4:13PM
Jean said...
wow, you are such an awsome human ... Im sure you are such a wonderful man with no flaws....let he without sin cast the first stone! I hope your blessed with every word you give onto others!
1-08-2009 @ 2:24PM
Keith said...
I had to laugh about several aspects of this but at the same time it does bring it home why gambling and lotteries have been illegal in many states. It is those who can't afford to live a decent life that are prone to spending money they do not have on lotteries. It's funny and sad that the gentleman in question had his "dreams" dashed, he is clueless to think $135k was going to move him, allow him to pay for kids college, and still live the life he'd always dreamed of? That $135k wasn't going get him beyond a year or two and if he didn't do something to change his financial income picture he's be in a worse position than he was in before he won it. There aren't that many people that can take a lottery win in stride in such a way as to have it really improve their life and not change it for the worse.
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1-08-2009 @ 6:14PM
Bryan said...
You hit the nail on the head. I might be able too make that last 2-3 years. Without colage,new house and other things
1-08-2009 @ 2:25PM
Justin said...
Well he never had $135,000 to begin with so he should be used to living without it and I would advise him to start investing that $3 into financial education.
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1-08-2009 @ 3:51PM
Butch said...
Come on Justin, really?? Save 3 dollars a week. How long will it take him to save for a 4 year low class college. For a 4 year total of 100,000 in tuition and living expenses (which is very low), it would take him 33,333 weeks. That's 641 years, I think a chance at $100,000 for the cost of $3 a week is a much better chance of coming true. Duh
1-09-2009 @ 2:13AM
lucy said...
Butch said it best..... $3 a week for thc chance at a dream is not so bad. You can't even go to a movie for that !!!
1-08-2009 @ 7:49PM
Angee said...
LMAO that's funny and so true. That's why they say don't count your chickens before they hatch.
1-08-2009 @ 2:26PM
EdgarLongenecker said...
P.S. Never mind, how many "mistakes," were sold, to be divided.... Divide the doubled money between the proven claimants.... who, actually filed for their money; not, any, who crawled out of the woodwork, after the fact; ie., ringer/shills of Organized Crime, AT LAW.... and, let's have a cap on winnings, so that there can be hundreds of winners, instead of one person winning the entire drop in the bucket, that, Organized Crime AT LAW, is scamming....Edgrrr....
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1-08-2009 @ 2:27PM
Brian said...
He and his family would be much better off with "safer" financial investments such as Keno.
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1-08-2009 @ 2:32PM
kathy said...
I think the lottery should pay up, because it was their mistake and not the people who paid for the tickets. I think the law needs to see to it that the lottery goes ahead and pay these people.
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1-08-2009 @ 2:42PM
basketpam said...
You know, no one has said anywhere that this many was spending large amounts of money on lottery tickets. And an occasional little flutter by spending a dollar (pocket change) on something which you may win big money is no worse than people wasting their money on cigarettes, cigars, alcohol and tons of unnecessary junk that all of you I can GUARANTEE have wasted it on. He would have spent 10 times that amount to go to a movie or 50 times that amount if he had taken the family and yet no one would have bitched if he had taken his family to a movie. Really people, it's a damn dollar, GET A LIFE. I know how he feels. My financial picture has changed drastically in the last 2 years due to poor health and every once in a while I buy a ticket, what are you going to do, lock me up? It gives you a little something to hope for, to wish for. Is that such a crime? Apparently to you bunch of self-righteous moralizing hypocrits it is. Just think back over 2008 and think about all the money you spent on unnecessary things and then throw your stones at someone who spent a dollar on a lottery ticket. And yes, living in a basement does suck, I've done it and you spend your life feeling like you're a second rate human being. You get very little sunshine and there are often other problems. Very rarely is it a healthy environment to raise children but people who don't have big paying jobs are forced into such circumstances. Remember, before you condemn, walk a mile in someone else's shoes first, then see if you can say the same things.
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1-08-2009 @ 3:11PM
Lynda said...
basketPam..
I agree with you 110%.. People judge everyone else but never find the faults in themselves. It was just a Lottery ticket people get over it.
1-08-2009 @ 2:53PM
sherry said...
you said perfectly pam when no one walks the shoes , you'll never know how it feels...i feel sorry for the guy its not fair i hope he finds a lawyer who will take the case and fight it...i think the court will see the lottery needs to pay up something. For the some of the blogs i read the economy is bad, everyone is a rock bottom if not now , you will be and hopefully you will remember how stupid you responded to this.....and have more sympathy later.....
1-08-2009 @ 3:06PM
Keith said...
Hey, you ever "played" Ebay? It's too easy to take any amount and double it. Go to a thrift store or garage sale, you'd be amazed at how many things can be bought for under $5.00 that can be sold for over $15.00 or more. I worked the proceeds of a couple of modest watches up to where I have $40,000 in watches now, I buy them on ebay and sell them on ebay, I sell a watch a day and make $20k a month. I deal with a guy that started with $40k and turned it into $3.5 million in inventory in three years that he clears $300k a month on. Ebay can be way more hope inspiring for someone who really wants to change their life in a way that they can control. Go to a thrift center and buy coffee carafes for a buck apiece and you'll get $5.00 to $10.00 for them. Go through books and buy first editions for .50c and put them up, buy cups and saucers that sell at a good price.
1-08-2009 @ 2:45PM
Patriot said...
You know whats even better than this story? Did you know that when someone wins the jackpot in the scratch off tickets the lottery commission does not announce it so when you buy your ticket thinking you can still win it ,IT'S JUST FRAUD ?? The money was paid and thier are no more tickets for the jackpot! If anyone but the government did this they would go to jail!
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1-08-2009 @ 2:47PM
Eileen said...
I am reading that people should not waste their money on the lottery when the live in a basement apartment and/or can't send their children to college.
I am low-income and I buy an occasional lottery ticket. $1 won't change much in my life if I set it aside but buying that ticket does give me one thing.....hope that one day my dreams will come true. I doubt that you people out there who criticize are in the financial situation that the man in the story was so please don't judge.
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1-08-2009 @ 2:50PM
havenotgirl said...
I think they should pay up. It would be better for their business to just pay the people, because there is no way in hell I'd buy a ticket from them now. As for the people claiming that $135,000 is no big deal and he should have saved his money for college tuition..I wish we were all as well off as you. I hardly ever play the lottery but ever so often I pray that maybe I will win something, anything, with my dollar in change. Being that desperate is no fun. Besides, do you really think that 3 dollars in a savings fund will send his kids to college and get him out of a basement? Is everything you buy worth it? I hope you pinch every dime and aren't just some well to do hypocrite. More than enough of those in the world.
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1-08-2009 @ 2:51PM
CCharb said...
So many "holier-than-thou" folks posting on here. People who obviously don't know what it feels like to realize that without a miracle, certain things just ain't gonna happen in your life. A college education for your kids might be one of them. What's the harm in spending a buck or two on a lottery ticket once in awhile? You high and mighty "better to invest your 3 dollars somewhere safer" folks, probably buy yourself a $5 latte on your way to work everyday. The guy is buying a ticket just once in awhile, like for our first Power Ball drawing we had here in Florida last night. Come on, if the Ontario tickets had been legit, then no one would be finding fault with it - we'd all be slapping the guy on the back and saying, "Way to go Joe!"
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