{"id":12686,"date":"2024-06-19T20:22:03","date_gmt":"2024-06-19T20:22:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/used82.com\/?p=12686"},"modified":"2024-06-19T20:22:03","modified_gmt":"2024-06-19T20:22:03","slug":"lottery-winners-have-winnings-withheld-after-making-simple-mistake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/used82.com\/?p=12686","title":{"rendered":"Lottery winners have winnings withheld after making \u2018simple mistake\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Officials have claimed they are now looking into the various issues.<\/h2>\n

Various US residents have claimed their lottery winnings have been withheld, and it may be down to an annoying glitch in the system.<\/strong><\/p>\n

According to\u00a0statistics<\/a>, Americans spent a whopping $105.26 billion on\u00a0lottery tickets<\/a>\u00a0last year alone – making it one of the biggest contributors to the gambling industry.<\/p>\n

Despite having a one in 292.2 million chance of ever winning the big jackpot, recent\u00a0polling data<\/a>\u00a0shows that around 50 percent of\u00a0USA-based<\/a>\u00a0players\u00a0buy a ticket<\/a> at least once a year.<\/p>\n

So, even though the odds are firmly stacked against us, it seems we can\u2019t get enough of taking our chances when they come.<\/p>\n

One lucky lottery winner, Bob Calamita, recently won a tidy $1,000 prize and headed down to his local office to collect his prize.<\/p>\n

However, when he tried to cash in his ticket, he was slapped with a letter from the\u00a0Florida<\/a>\u00a0Department of Economic Opportunity claiming he owed them money.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s stated that Calamita, who won back in March, would need to fork out $3,000 for an unemployment overpayment made during\u00a0the pandemic<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Speaking to WFLA, the winner\u00a0said<\/a>: “I stay there about an hour and a half to be told \u2018Sorry, you\u2019re not getting this because you owe money on the DEO system\u2019.<\/p>\n

\n
\"Bob<\/div>\n

Bob Calamita eventually received his lottery winnings. (WPEC)<\/cite><\/div>\n

\u201cIf I owed money, I would have paid it. I have no problem with that, but I didn\u2019t owe money.\u201d<\/p>\n

After some back-and-forth, it\u2019s said that the state eventually handed Calamita a cheque for the full $1,000 he was owed.<\/p>\n

An investigation claimed that there had been a mix-up and a computer-generated error in its fraud system had incorrectly flagged the man as a perpetrator.<\/p>\n

The Florida Department of Economic Opportunity has previously stated it’s looking into the problem.<\/p>\n

Interestingly, Calamita isn\u2019t the only Florida resident who allegedly had their lottery winnings withheld.<\/p>\n

Kathleen Lambert headed to Florida Lottery office in Gainesville after winning $1,000 on a scratch card – only to be told she had a $1,200 debt to settle.<\/p>\n

\u201cTalk about a thrill,\u201d she told WOFL. \u201cI was so excited, laughing and showing everybody, but that was very short-lived when we drove an hour and a half to the Gainesville lottery office waiting for that nice check. And my jaw dropped.”<\/p>\n

\n
\"Kathleen<\/div>\n

Kathleen Lambert thought her winnings being withheld was ‘sneaky’. (FOX 35 News)<\/cite><\/div>\n

It\u2019s claimed that Lambert\u2019s husband owed $1,200 from unemployment benefit overpayments during the pandemic.<\/p>\n

However, she said that they hadn\u2019t been informed about\u00a0the debt<\/a>\u00a0and had previously paid out $275 after receiving an overpayment letter.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s downright sneaky,\u201d she admitted. \u201cIt\u2019s like, we don\u2019t owe you any money, you overpaid, you waived it you said, but then if you win the lottery you don\u2019t get anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

FloridaCommerce has previously said it was looking into the case.<\/p>\n

It seems as if Lambert and Calamita\u2019s winnings being withheld was due to the Multi-State Lottery Association\u2019s legislation.<\/p>\n

They say that if residents owe debts, child support or taxes, states can allow their agencies to collect those funds from lottery winnings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Officials have claimed they are now looking into the various issues. Various US residents have…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"views":87,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12686\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}