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Lottery winner doesn’t have to share

An elderly Connecticut woman does not have to share her half of a $500,000 lottery windfall with her sister who sued her over it, a judge rules.
/ Source: The Associated Press

An elderly Connecticut woman does not have to share her half of a $500,000 lottery windfall with her sister who sued her over it, a judge ruled Wednesday.

Eighty-seven-year-old Rose Bakaysa and her 84-year-old sister, Theresa Sokaitis, have been fighting over the money in court since 2005. That was shortly after Bakaysa and their brother won the Powerball jackpot.

Sokaitis argued they had signed a notarized contract a decade earlier to split all gambling profits. But Bakaysa maintained that the deal ended in 2004 during a spat over a few hundred dollars.

New Britain Superior Court Judge Cynthia Swienton agreed with Bakaysa, ruling that the contract ended during the argument.