She thought she had hit the jackpot, but her fortune is slipping through her fingers because of an administrative decision… When Jane Doe – that’s obviously a pseudonym – discovered one day in February that she had just won the equivalent of €71.5 million in the lottery, she wept with joy. All her life, the 83-year-old Texan pensioner had been waiting for a miracle. The miracle was finally here. It was supposed to be the end of her worries. As you can imagine, the joy was short-lived. Just one week after hitting the jackpot, the dream turned into a nightmare: today, the elderly woman still hasn’t received a single cent, and it’s not certain that she’ll ever see a penny.
She becomes a millionaire… or not
It all began on 17 February 2025, when Jane Doe decided to buy a ticket for the Lotto Texas lottery. Rather than go to the local tobacconist, she opted for the comfort of technology and chose a mobile application: Jackpocket Lottery. Convenient, fast, seemingly secure… in principle, everything was fine. In principle.
As you can see, fate smiled on the pensioner. Her numbers exactly matched those drawn at random, and all hell broke loose: Jane Doe became an instant millionaire. Barely a week after this magical moment, the Texas Lottery abruptly decided to put an end to the use of unregulated third-party services to purchase lottery tickets, including the Jackpocket Lottery application.
Officially, this sudden decision is justified by a legal loophole that the organisation wishes to fill: until now, these applications allowed Texans to legally purchase their tickets from approved retailers without any clear regulation as to the fees charged or how they are managed. Unofficially, it saves 71.5 million euros.
The problem for Jane Doe is that this ban comes after the draw, but before she collects her prize money. This administrative detail was enough to freeze her astronomical winnings. The pensioner is now stuck.
The legal battle against the lotto is on
Faced with this flagrant injustice, our protagonist has not said her last word. On 19 May, accompanied by her lawyers, she decided to take the Texas Lottery to court. Her defence was unstoppable on paper: it is not legal to change the rules of the game after the winning numbers have been drawn. According to the complaint, the lottery was trying to retroactively deprive the winner of her prize by banning the application used at the time of the win.
But American justice being what it is, the proceedings could take months or even years. For Jane Doe, every day spent waiting turns into agony. She thought she was going to live out her life in peace, but here she is, embroiled in a legal battle. At 83, Jane no longer has time for this nonsense.
Meanwhile, other players seem to have found an infallible method. One example is the Romanian mathematician who was able to win the jackpot 14 times over thanks to a perfectly-oiled strategy. For the unfortunate Texan, now is not the time for clever calculations: she simply hopes that justice will soon return what luck had given her.
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Oh my gosh, that is completely ridiculous! That poor eighty-three year old woman won that lottery fair and square! It is beyond tragically unjust for the Texas Lottery to change the “administrative details” before she could collect her winnings. It is entirely unfair!!
Give the retiree her winnings. You dont change rules. After the lady wins. Sounds like a crooked lotterie to me. Maybe some fat cat at the top. Is cashing in on the retireees money. Cut the red goverment tape. Give her the winnings.