Did you guys buy Mega Millions tickets? Some of my friends here in Virginia did, but I heard on the radio that you were 50 times more likely to get hit by lightning so I didn’t bother. Occasionally I play the lottery, and about 15 years ago I hit 5/6 two digit numbers and won about $2,400 in NY State. I know the odds are independent each time, but I assume I won’t get that lucky again. Plus you always hear those stories about people winning the lottery and their lives getting messed up, but who am I kidding? It’s not like I haven’t bought tickets and fantasized about it.
There were three winning tickets issued for the $640 million Mega Millions jackpot, the largest jackpot in US history. Lottery spokespeople confirmed that winning tickets were sold in Maryland, Illinois and Kansas. None of the winners have officially stepped forward, either anonymously or otherwise (it depends on the state whether you can collect winnings anonymously) to claim their earnings. Miranda Wilson, a McDonalds worker in Baltimore and a single mother of seven, claims she hit the jackpot. Wilson’s coworkers pooled their money and asked her to buy tickets for them, but she refuses to share. Wilson claims that she bought the winning ticket separate from the tickets she purchased with her coworkers’ money. She even went so far as to claim she found a dollar on the floor with which she bought the winning ticket. Only she sent a coworker into the 7-Eleven to buy it for her. It’s confusing and it’s not adding up for me. Wilson hasn’t show lottery officials her ticket, and she wouldn’t show it to any reporters who interviewed her either. Here’s more, thanks to Radar:
In a story hotter than the franchise’s coffee, the mystery continues over a Maryland McDonald’s worker who claims she won a third of Friday’s Mega Millions grand prize — $218 million in installments, or a lump sum of $105 million — as she refused to show the ticket to a reporter Monday.
As we previously reported, Mirlande Wilson infuriated 15 of her McDonald’s co-workers, who claimed she’s trying to hoard the super-size serving of cash with tickets they all pitched in for. Wilson says she purchased the winning ticket in a separate batch, apart from her colleagues at the Golden Arches.
“I’m so shocked, I don’t know what’s going on,” Wilson, a single mother-of-seven, told a reporter from NBC’s Washington D.C. affiliate Monday from her Baltimore home, when asked about her huge windfall.
The reporter asked Wilson, “Where is the winning ticket? Is it here?” to which she responded, “I cannot show you.”
Wilson said McDonald’s co-workers crying foul “have the copies” of the tickets purchased as a group, which would back up her story over the winners being bought in a separate batch.
Authorities with the state’s lottery commission have confirmed the winner was bought at a 7-Eleven store in Milford Mill, Maryland, but said no one has come forward to cash it in yet, meaning the scuttlebutt over Wilson is meaningless until she steps forward to redeem her riches.
[From Radar]
A Fox News story states that the McDonalds where Wilsonworked is in Westport, a section of Baltimore, MD. I found the location of the 7-Eleven in Millford Mill where the winning ticket was sold, and Google Maps has it as a full twenty minutes away from the Westport area. So it’s possible that that the ticket was purchased all the way over there if the woman had to drive to work or was in the area, but it’s not like it’s right nearby.
This lady’s story is sketchy to me and I doubt she actually won the lottery or she would have shown the ticket to a reporter. (Video of two interviews with her are below.) Plus her affect seems off to me, like she’s too haughty and cold about the whole thing. Whether she’s lying or telling the truth, it’s incredibly cruel to the people she works with. If she’s telling the truth about hitting the jackpot (not about buying the ticket “separately,” that’s another issue), she’s facing a bunch of well deserved lawsuits. If she’s lying, I hope she didn’t need the money from working at McDonalds, because she’s probably going to get fired.
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You are a very messed up individual if you can’t share over half a billion dollars. Sorry, just my opinion.
It’s actually a little over $200 million because of the split, but that doesn’t change your point any!
People are soooooo greedy when any money shows up. A million just isn’t enough when you know there are hundreds more.
However, I think her pants are on fire because she is lying.
$200 mil before taxes, so it’ll keep shrinking.
But yeah, she didn’t win. …I did.
People are fundamentally venal. No surprise.
I believe a court ruled in another, similar case that she will have to share unless she can prove that she did buy the ticket separate, like with a credit card statement and receipt.
I remember this case, but I seem to recall that when you collect money in a pool to buy tickets, no tickets can be considered separate or individual. If it goes to court, she will be forced to pay everyone their share. On a different note, what a C U Next Tuesday for real!
I hope so. Although I suspect she’s lying about the whole thing.
Very strange, very fishy.
Yeah, I saw that too – if she really did win, most likely she’ll be facing the same sort of lawsuit, and probably the same result.
I think she’s lying about winning at all, if it were for real she’d be keeping quiet until everything was verified. She’s probably enjoying the attention. Nut.
I bought the tickets for our little office pool, and photocopied them and handed them out immediately. If I had bought any on my own I would have gone to a different place and made sure everything was separate – and I still would have given my coworkers some cash had I won on my own.
If she’s not lying about winning, I think she’s lawyered up and is trying to figure out how to keep all the money for herself. Otherwise she has 7 children, I can’t imagine she’d risk her income on a lie as stupid as this.
You can’t buy lottery tickets with credit cards – even debit cards. They are cash only… so I don’t know how this would work..
Attention-seek much?
She better be careful cos people get killed over stuff like this. Shouldnt she be anonymous at least?
I actually live nearby this area and happened to drive by that 7-11 on Saturday. The amount of news crews in the parking lot was insane, and traffic around the whole area was just jammed because people were waiting to see if someone would show up to claim their winnings.
I bet that this lady is lying she even won in the first place, and just using the media hype to get some public attention, however negative it is. Because that’s how today’s society works. Doesn’t matter if the attention is positive or negative….people just want it and the money that comes with it.
Looks bad either way.
Plain greed. She’ll be sued, she’ll lose & she’ll still have to pay up including lawyer fees. Money does strange things to people
There is such an easy solution to pooling tickets. Just write down or make copies of the selected numbers for all contributors so that they know what they purchased.
I did both…bought $5 worth myself and $10 with coworkers pooled. With the coworkers, everybody in the pool got a photocopy of the “pool” tickets. I mean come on, it is 2012 there are photocopiers everywhere, including the office stall at the McDonalds. If not that then 99% of the people in the pool have a cell phone with a camera and could have taken pictures of the “pool” tickets. This whole scenerio is shady…I mean a Haitian immigrant with 7 kids claims she won but won’t show anybody the tickets? There’d be lawyers, money managers and some cleric right beside all the media to “advise” her if this was true. But it is making for good fodder.
I don’t know about the States, but in Canada, right on the ticket, it advises you not to show ANYONE the winning ticket before cashing it. They also have pamphlets at the lotto dealers saying the same thing.
Seriously, if someone said “show me your quarter of a billion dollars or I think you’re a liar”…well then they will just have to think I’m a liar.
They did make copies. She said the coworkers have the copies.
That was my point with my last post. It is very simple…if the members of the group have copies of the “pool” purchase tix they would have got them before the drawing, so either they have the “proof” by that copy and she will have to fess up and share (or wind up in jail or deported for lottery fraud) or she did buy her own ticket, separate from the group (like I did) and she doesn’t have an obligation to share with anybody. It is that cut and dry.
I don’t understand…if THEY all have a photocopy of the winning numbers, purchased as a group, and there are no winning numbers on this photocopy, where is the argument? however, that being said, if she DID purchase a separate ticket, and won, as a decent human being, she SHOULD give them ALL some dollars regardless. How would she feel if the shoe was on the other foot?.. how greedy can one person be…?
If they have copies, and the winning number is not in their copies, then tough sh*t for them. It’s not their ticket. So sorry, play again next time.
Would I give some great big cash gifts to my co workers if I won in this situation? Sure. It’s a nice (though not obligatory) thing to do.
But if they demanded a piece of it? I am not OBLIGED to share just because we played a different set of tickets together. And I think that it’s the “gimme gimme–it’s mine too! No fair!” that makes them unworthy of a single dollar. If they insist that they’re entitled due to sheer proximity, then I think they’re greedy dicks now.
No gifts for you.
Yes, this exactly. I put in $5 to the office pool and bought $5 worth of tickets by myself. We all received photocopies of the tickets we all got together. If I’d won by myself, they wouldn’t have gotten SHIT. I have a huge family (as in, my dad has 17 brothers and sisters and my mom has 6), many of them are ill, and a lot have money problems back in my home country. I wouldn’t bat an eye to keep all of the money and help my family vs. giving it to coworkers just because they happen to have lost a pool that I was a part of. F that.
This issue has come up many times. When the hell are people going to learn that if you play the lottery in a pool you cannot expect to keep winning money if you also play on your own? It’s been tested in court and each time the pool has won. Have whatever opinion you want, but the courts have determined that once you enter a pool all winnings belong to the pool. That’s why I buy my own tickets.
what’s not in the story above, is: the manager gave her some more money the day of the drawing to buy more tickets, but instead of putting the tickets in the safe at work (with the previously bought pool tickets) she took the new tickets home … if she did win,,she might as well get ready to pay up as there is no way to prove whose money paid for which ticket
Yeah, maybe she didn’t know that all those ticket transactions are on tape. They’ll know if she bought her one winning ticket separately. I didn’t know that.
I had already made my list of charities I was going to support not to mention my family who would never worry for a penny if I’d won the money. This lady is pathetic not to share with co-workers who paid for the tickets too. I don’t believe her that she bought some for herself. She should worry about being an good example for, her what was it, 7 kids!
There was this woman at a office I used to work at who pulled something like this. She would take bets on the Superbowl (which I guess is more than just who is going to win? You bet on plays and stuff?).
When the time came to pay up, she would claim that this person hadn’t really made the right bet or that person never gave her the money. I remember one year she didn’t even bother to pretend it was fair and claimed that no one had won except her. She must have pocketed a few hundred dollars.
Everyone who played were out of their mind with rage every year, but no one had the nerve to call her a thief to her face. As far as I know she’s still doing the pool.
Sorry to say, if her coworkers are still going along they’re idiots.
Lol yeah, honestly I don’t know why everyone let her be in charge of it in the first place. I would never have given her money even if I did know anything about sports.
Whenever there would be an office party and the bosses would get employees a six foot sub (Klassy, right?) we used to catch her wrapping up whole feet of the sandwich and putting them in her work station before people even got off for lunch.
Wow, that woman is a 14-karat greed dumpster. As it happens, the party sub scenario hit close to home. My mother’s home, at least. Your former co-worker clown sounds EXACTLY like so many of the miserable losers who work with my mother. Yep, that’s plural. Sometimes the crap these ‘ladies’ pull is so far out, ‘What the f–our score and seven years ago.’
Last month, I was visiting her and seemed even angrier than usual (and Jamaican mothers are livid on their most temperate of days).
I don’t remember what prefaced the luncheon, but there were panini sandwiches for all the of the employees. Not only had people bailed for lunch early to get the front of the line, but they didn’t bother to wash their hands before pawing all of the sandwiches–did I mention that my mother works in a nursing home? Let that marinate, they sure did. And my mother has effluvia stories that churn the bellies of pantywaists like me. And they didn’t wash their hands. Ew. Krack Klass.
And the final insult? All of these women were taking all of three or four of the sandwiches BEFORE everyone had been served. Because it’s easier to feed your family by taking the food out of someone else’s mouth. You have a job, this isn’t the fucking food bank you selfish miscarriages of character.
So, for all their trouble of actually working and washing their hands, my mother and a bunch of other women got nothing. And since it was a catered event and everything, they didn’t bring lunch that day. My mother gets off of work at 11:00 pm.
Ugh, greedy frigging bitches.
See, this is one of those things where you get one chance. I have worked with ustanding people that have run office pools and lottery ticket buying on the up and up, but I cant imagine using someone shady a 2nd time.
Sadly, that kind of behavior is part of human nature. Many people would do the same I am sure.
Single mom with 7 kids working at McDonalds? Jesus! Unless she is in management I don’t see how she can make that work! And here Kate Gosselin thinks she can’t make less than a million to support her 8 kids.
Anyway, if she can prove she bought a separate ticket then I’d still throw the co-workers some cash just because. How greedy can you be?
If someone tried to demand money that was rightfully mine?
I’d get greedy pretty f*cking fast. I’m not giving cash gifts to someone trying to screw me over. You don’t get a trophy just for participating, sorry. And if you kick and scream and demand one, your character has proven that you deserve nothing.
With you all the way Zelda.
Ugh, I got pissed off immediately when I read that reporter saying show me your ticket? Doesn’t anyone realize that they are potentially putting this woman in danger?
Assuming that she is telling the truth, if I were her, I’d get me some extra locks for my doors stat! Then get a new cell phone, have calls forwarded to my new number and screen ALL my calls.
Money makes people crazy and that’s a lot of cash.
Ugh.
If she has a winning ticket, the store she purchased it from most likely has time stamped video.
Especially a 7-11.
Which I suspect the local Lottery commission, has already demanded the tape from the store.
So it is just a matter of time before a copy of the tape… ends up on CNN.
Side note Who in there right mind would take the lump sum of 105 when you get could payments of the 218? I mean, what would you even do with a lump sum of that amount? Maybe that’s why so many lottery winners lose it because they suddenly have this HUGE lump sum of money and absolutely no clue what to do with it.
one word: taxes.
Most finance experts were saying it was better to take the lump sum.
One reason it is good to be a Canadian…we only pay taxes on the earnings of lottery winnings, not the initial prize itself.
If I could ever win things, I’d love that about this place, too. But I don’t play, so it’s a moot point, I guess.
@Jo Mamma I never win anything either, but I love that (and many other things) about being Canadian. I always wonder if the person winning this or that on TV game shows actually has the cash to pay the taxes and take the prizes home.
YES!!
Remember Pimp My Ride? I remember thinking that the insurance must be a nightmare as well as being a moving target for theft Extreme Home–I don’t know why I can’t remeber the name, but it’s the same idea, right? ‘I’m Lindsay Lohan, move that bus!’
Canada does have a lot going for it, and once we start hoarding our natural resources, the sun, moon, stars and amputations will all be OURS! Cthulu fhtagn!!
I said the same thing, but my father, who is a financial expert explained it this way: if you take the spread out payments you are essentially taking the “lump sum” with their interest, say 3% spread over “X” amount of years. If you’re smart, you take the lump sum, find sound investments like bonds that pay out more than 3% and make much more that the amount that would be spread out by the lottery. Most “smart” people get a lawyer and a financial adviser when they win the lottery. Most people are advised to take the lump sum and invest it, I’m guessing once the check comes in they forget to do so.
Ohh…that makes sense. I’ve always wondered about how the taxes and such work on big lottery winnings.
Because the taxes are taken out, and the rest is free and clear.
Every time I buy a ticket, I always get cash option for this very reason.
Plus, taxes are always expected to increase — so while you may pay 40% in taxes on your payout this year, there’s every chance you’ll be taxed higher on the payout in years to come. Plus, if you die, the payments stop; your heirs can’t claim the remainder of your winnings.
Nothing ruins relationships and friendships faster than money.
There was a similar case where a man pulled that same crap on his co-workers. He used that same old “I bought it separately” crap too. He lost in court. How greedy can one be? If she does have the winning ticket, she will lose in court if she does not share the winnings. If she was buying separate tickets, did she inform her co-workers? All she has to do is prove it. The ticket will show some proof to that effect. What a bitch.
If the group has photocopies of X number of tickets which they agreed to buy, and that ticket isn’t in the bunch, then they don’t own it. She has a right to buy as many tickets as she likes apart from them, without informing them.
Your are right, she does, but if you were in a pool with her, wouldn’t you want to know that the person buying the tickets is also buying on their own? Just as a courtesy.
It’s so funny to see how the people who always win have no business ever being around that kind of money.
…?
Please explain.
From: ‘Ask A Dowager Who Cares’, Modern Henpecking Quarterly. Mayfair (that’s all you need to know, jackanape): Hey, You Incorrigible Telegram Boy Press. 19–, pp 56-As If You Can Read This, You Illiterate So-And-So.
Well, in this great chain of being, it simply won’t do if people presume to venture out of their social strata. It disrupts the natural order and suddenly shoeshine boys and selzer lads start putting on airs. Suddenly, the whole labour force is coming at us with these demands for ‘rest’. ‘Rest?’ Doesn’t the broom do the majority of the job for you, you insolent cur? And if you keep getting stuck in those flues, it’s no major logical coup to come to the conclusion that I have extended my grace too far. Have they any idea of what it costs to produce a pint of pottage for every second day? I suppose it doesn’t matter, now. Adolescent testicular cancer is a disease of the mind and nothing else. Didn’t we discuss this at the last ‘Weepeth Not For The Chimney Sweeps Of Half-Moon Street’ gathering?
Such a good comment, I wanna have Jo babies.
Absolutely! Donald Trump Jr, the Ecclestone sisters, Leona Helmsley and Conrad Black all prove that money you inherit or earn equals class.
I’m open to inflicting my progeny on an innocent world, but know this: Either they are raised Coptic Scientologist, or this will never happen. I’m still trying to shake Phelps off of me–apparently his children are not old enough to hear about the Interplanetary Jesuits.
Oh mercy, those people listed! Has there ever before been such a collection? Leona didn’t like it when I made eye contact–where’s that dog, now! Where’s Precious? Conrad, ugh. I remember the day when I told my psychiatrist that he was being released years above schedule. Normally a very composed gentleman, he was pissed and it was hilarious. It was heightened because he’s from India and knowing that my mother immigrated to Canada, it added a whole layer to his rage. It was the one time (to date) when I cackled like a goon in his office. Good times.
Trump: The ritziest, swankiest, hugest, gold-plate-iest, scourge of God we’ve got going.
You just named so many ghouls, that I… I think I just voided my ovaries.
I think I have to go pray.
sad how people always come to blows over money.
You know what, I believe her. She has copies of all the tickets for the pool and so do the employees. She says the winning numbers were on a single ticket that she had an employee purchase for her. So this ticket would contain one set of numbers and none of the employees would have a copy of it. She isn’t jumping around and hysterical but all of this is a lot to take in. Maybe I’m just Nieve hope not!
See my comments above. I agree.
Yeah, I don’t get why being in a failed pool entitles the other members to a share of money you’ve won independently, either. If she really did provide them with photocopies, and the winning numbers aren’t there, what’s their damage? If the winning numbers WERE there, the media would be all over those photocopies. They aren’t.
Whether she’s won at all is another issue, but if her co-workers have proof she bought them unsuccessful tickets in the right numbers, then she ain’t the one I regard as greedy.
The article conveniently leaves out the fact she was given an additional $5 by the manager to buy tickets on Friday. That’s the issue. The manager & employees are saying she took pool money and bought the winning ticket with their money, not hers.
I live the area as well. The shady part is, last minute the mcd’s store owner gave her $5 so he could go in on the pool. So she bought some more tickets on her way home from work. They did xerox copy everything & it was kept in the safe. I guess it’s hard to argue or prove whose money really bought that winning ticket.
I don’t think someone would lie about winning the lottery. What possible benefit could it serve? She might lie about who paid for the ticket, but unless she’s mentally ill, then I assume that she has the winning numbers.
Lucky duck.
People lie about insane things that will inevitably catch up with them — I know a number of women who have lied about miscarriages to keep a man and pregnancies when their husbands decide to leave. It’s like it doesn’t occur to them that their medical records will show the truth, or that if you claim to be pregnant, you’re going to have to produce a baby at some point. Weird.
Those may be stupid lies, but the benefits are at least obvious, if short term. There aren’t any benefits to this lie that I can see.
Having said that, someone in the UK also claimed to have won the lottery when they hadn’t, I seem to recall. They even spend a shedload of cash they didn’t have I think? It was a weird story, and much less of a jackpot at stake. So crazy is a possibility. Then again, so is her having won.
7 kids? lady needs to keep her legs closed, for starters. I think she’s crazy and lying.
If this lady is behaving this way right now, her life just ain’t going to get any better. In fact, I’d wager that, in keeping with the whole “lottery winners tend to watch their lives go down the drain post-win” thing, it’s all downhill from here. If she’s already making these kind of dubious claims, alienating her friends and co-workers with her greed and counting every one of those 200 million pennies, she’s a lost cause. I’m being bitchy, but I seriously hope she doesn’t win a damn thing, because that’s some serious dysfunction there.
In somewhat related news, did anyone hear about the woman in the States who won the lottery, bought a bunch of tickets and handed them out to strangers, including a homeless man outside her local convenience store? It seems he won, and she wants her winning ticket back. Crap almighty, huh?
She’s single and has seven kids. That should tell you something about this woman.
That she works really hard and probably could use the break more than a lot of people who had tickets?
I agree.
Apparently some women reproduce asexually, and thus all the reponsibility is theirs. And nobody is ever widowed, and no man ever walks out on his family, and reproductive choice means other people’s.
Glad my jaw isn’t the only one to drop over some of these comments. Rush Limbaugh’s support is suddenly looking a damn sight easier to comprehend.
Jeezus! I think I better leave this thread. I just can’t with some of these comments. Sexism will never end when we women keep proving that we’re our own worse enemy.
I know, I know this is Celebitchy. But this woman isn’t a celebrity, we don’t know a thing about her other than what’s been reported here. Why the rush to hate?
Agreed. And totally agree about certain people that should not be around this kind of money.
I give her a year before she’s broke. Stupid people make stupid decisions about money.
Good argument for not going in on a pool…
Okay, let’s find out what actually happened before we lynch the woman.
I’m not saying it’s ideal, but for a group so unwaveringly obsessive about ‘slut shaming’ and would go to the Cross to hold up ‘homewrecker’s rights’, I’m seeing a lot of torches and pitchforks out for someone about whom we know almost nothing. At any rate, profligate sexual history isn’t illegal, and you don’t get to turn it into a crime to use it as a weapon on people you don’t like. If she’s guilty, she’s guilty, but if that’s going to happen it’s going to happen in the near future. Until then…well, this isn’t then, is it? The case will be easily solved so the lottery doesn’t need to recruit a team of Personal Wrath Consultants. The easily-gained truth will do a better job than we could.
And they’ll find out. Not long ago here, this family-run corner store sold a winning ticket and tried to claim the winnings for themselves. They put those bitches on ice. Do you really think that any security would be left un-secured when millions of dollars are involved? That they could just lose track of it for all time. No, that’s the mayor of Toronto (ex-con, nepotist, domestic disturbance-collecting, reactionary, library phobic) Rob Ford does.
Just this.
Everyone is so quick to jump all over her. SHE is the one with the paperwork on her side. Can’t help but suspect that if she were a U.S.-born widow with 2.5 children and a job as a schoolteacher in Portland, there’d be a helluva lot more “let’s just wait and see” in these comments.
That could very well be. I hope it’s not, I don’t want to be the kind of person who expects the worst cliches out of everyone, but sometimes I do wonder.
Thank you Jo Mama! I’ve always been a fan of your comments (and you’re unique style of expression) but this, this one I could kiss for you. My spleen is restored. 🙂
Hey, that was a really nice thing to say. Thank-you, I appreciate it, and I’m glad that my ‘not suitable in front of actual people’ rantings bring entertainment, that’s super as well.
Being a maniac here keeps me from screaming out there.
Thanks again!
*your not you’re.* Sigh.
I can’t get to reply to you but I just wanted to say that I’m a long time lurker over at Pajiba so I *know* you from there as well. *hugs*
she’s lying.
The only reason I’d get tore up about a winning lottery ticket would be if it were mine and I lost it. Otherwise, not my problem.
It always amazes me just how STUPID people get when money is involved…whether its money from the lottery or when a family members dies. The greed and selfishness that some people display is just tacky!
Well it said that her co-workers have photo copies of the tickets she bought that were shared. Also whoever said she would have to prove it with a credit card reciept is stupid, you can’t buy lotto with a credit card! Let’s just wait and see, I hope she proves everyone wrong and really did win, sounds like she could really use the help. At least it wasn’t some rich celeb who won, they should be banned from playing.
Oh, and in the end it will be the lawyers who make out like bandits.
Stupid!
Me too
I don’t understand why some people buy tickets as a group. It’s just stupid and ends up with people who can’t share it and split properly. Like here. Why won’t you go and by it by yourself?
Exactly. The odds of winning are 1 in 176 million. It’s not like pooling with your coworkers is actually improving your odds.
I’ve never understood that, either. I always kind of assumed that must be some of gambler’s internal logic about which I know nothing because it seemed odd.
I’d be genuinely interested in learning why people do it. Does anyone here enter into these pool agreements?
I guess because you can get more chances without having to waste anymore of your own money. If each of the 15 people put in $5 then their chances go up to 75 in 176 million.
Which is still crazy odds, but hey, this isn’t the first time someone has won in a pool, right?
She’s stupid if she doesn’t just go in with them now and get the split a head of time. After the fact she’ll have to share her winnings with a lawyer to help her with the case. I don’t know about Virginia but I know in Indiana you can’t buy tickets with a credit or debit card you have to pay in cash so it’s hard to prove you bought tickets separately. I’m surprised there isn’t more lottery pool etiquette. Like everyone in the pool has to initial or sign the back of the lottery tickets. So if someone in the pool buys tickets on their own those will be separate from the pool. Also if someone misses a day from work they don’t get an input in the pool unless they showed up with their dollar to sign the tickets.
Time stamps on the bundle of tickets purchased and print-outs she says she has will prove her case or not. If what she says is true, her ticket will be a different number sold (or place) and time stamp.
With that big of pot, one would think all pools would have gotten copies of their cards w/ more than 1 person holding the tickets and copies.