Credit Card Fraud and Lottery Winnings

From the “How Stupid Is That” file … I was just reading about a woman in Oregon that won $1 million from the state lottery. Pretty sweet, huh? Well, she allegedly bought the ticket with a credit card that belonged to her dead mother-in-law. Now, the woman finds herself in court battling to keep the cash. If there was ever a reason to make sure you are fully authorized to use a credit card, this has got to be it.

The woman, Christina Elizabeth Goodenow, won the lottery back in October of 2005. At this point, she has refused to give up the money she won as she faces counts of forgery, theft, and identity fraud. Apparently, she had been using the credit card for about a six week period – more than a year after her mother-in-law had died. In all, she had charged over $11,000 on the card. Amazingly, after winning the lottery, she continued using her deceased mother-in-law’s card and it ultimately led authorities directly to her.

Since the lottery ticket was allegedly purchased fraudulently, prosecutors are seeking to have Ms. Goodenow return the cash winnings. The District Attorney’s Office had the remaining $10,800 in her bank account frozen from her initial $33,500 pay out and had it placed in an escrow account for the local police department.

So, where is Goodenow right now as she awaits trial for the alleged fraudulent credit card usage? In jail serving a six month sentence for violating her probation on a conviction for methamphetamine possession in 2004.  So whatever you do people, please don’t buy your lottery tickets with bogus credit cards.  Bad idea.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, November 16th, 2006 at 10:41 pm and is filed under Credit Card News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.