I'm kind of ambivalent about this. He got a nice chunk of change; why line the pockets of attorneys and you might not win.  The Judge seems to be inclined to grant him his wish, though I'm sure the lottery involved has high powered attorneys @ their disposal.  I know some LP members are legal experts, my concern is could he be sued for slander or is the proper word libel???

Slander and libel are particular forms of defamation, which means to make false statements (written or spoken) about a person or group that harms their reputation. What false statements has Lucky Larry made about the lottery? Saying that the lottery was rigged is an established matter of fact. Saying that because it was rigged he should win more money is his opinion, and will be decided by the courts. The lottery harmed its reputation all on its own.

Excellent points there that I didn't consider.  Good luck to him.

Years before retiring, our competitor hospital was sued by patients through Attorneys stating they got MRSA from the hospital.  It has been a community acquired infection for years.  That hospital, like mine, has high powered Attorney's on their staff.   Well tables got turned and those Attorneys got sued for defamation. 

If Eddie doesn't rig that draw, he doesn't win it, and the jackpot rolls, to where Larry Dawson would have won that money.

It doesn't matter that he won 9 million. He should have won what Eddie stole too.

For starters it's obvious the drawings were rigged and only one combination had a chance of winning the jackpot. Because one ticket had the winning numbers the jackpot was lowered for the next drawing and that's is basis for the lawsuit. 

IMO a problem with Dawson's case is it can't be proved had the jackpot rolled without the cheating, he would be the eventual single ticket winner. But it will be simple to prove the lottery was negligent in providing fair drawings. And there is the question of what they did with the prize winnings.

In this world you have to be a fighter in order to get what's yours!

I will be very honest. He does not deserve a penny. The only reason he won is because of Eddie . If Eddie did not program he would have lost. So he needs to thank Eddie . $9 million is a lot of money to win in a game people never had a chance 😂 if Eddie knew there was a parasite trying to steal $9 million from is secret number combination eddie would have changed the numbers lol

Dawson won after Eddie rigged the drawing, but you may be correct if the lottery can prove Eddie rigged all future drawings. But I doubt they'll even try because that would destroy their credibility and open the door to more lawsuits. 

There was $millions spent trying to win a Hot Lotto jackpot and Dawson picked his own numbers to win.

He and his wife started playing Hot Lotto about three months ago after reading a book that claimed to have the secrets to winning the lottery. He followed the recommendations, which included buying 19 plays for each drawing to cover all the Hot Ball options.

At least he stuck with the system long enough to give it a chance.

But he said he was beginning to doubt the book's advice just before he won.

Spending $38 on two draws a week gets old after three months and why Dawson was about ready to hang it up. I'm more interested in the system then the lawsuit.

Brilliant and down to earth common sense answer. I can always tell the "real legal experts" on lp who provide short common sense answers that all members can understand vs long quasi legalese sounding opinions copied off the internet.

There is a defense that the state can raise and possibly support with statistical data (at least enough to negotiate a settlement).  Had Eddie not won the fraudulent drawing, the jackpot would have rolled over and been much greater in subsequent draws.  However, the greater the jackpot, the more tickets sold.  If the jackpot had been millions higher, the state would have sold more tickets and there could have been a winner earlier than Larry's win.  It is a bit of speculation, but I'm sure the state can find some expert to testify to it.

Sounds like "Lucky Larry" may have run through the bulk of his 9M already and now needs more and this might just be an easier way to get it than playing the lottery again?

I hope not because Lucky Larry is a financial adviser.

Lucky Larry better hope that the jury they empanel are not sore lottery losers. They could figure that Larry got lucky in the past, why add more to his windfall. There are lots of bitter folks out there. Ex wife, ex gf who offs the ex because “ if l can’t have you, no one can.” It’s a jungle out there.Let’s hope that the luck Larry lives by, can see him through these trying times. 

Larry may get lucky again but I also see the tables turn around on him if they stastic expert say that might have not won at all if the jackpot rolled over and lottery decides to rule his win disqualified due to the tampering of the machine I hope not but they could then take back his win.

We will see how the lottery plays the numbers game come Dec.

Personally I hope he wins and the lottery pays out triple + lawyer fees.

By the judge letting it move forward this allows the continued discussion and analysis of this issue. 

On the other hand, he would not have won anything if Eddie Tipton hadn't fixed the draw. Someone else might have won in that case, with other numbers.

Eddie Tipton did not rig every drawing. There were only certain draws that he knew which set of numbers was to be drawn.

The lawsuit is about if the Hot Lotto wasn't rigged and Eddie didn't win it "Lucky Larry" might have won a bigger prize. On the other hand, it could have been won prior to the draw that Larry hit.

Being that there were no winners of the jackpot after the one Tipton won and Larry won the $9 mil, he is suing for the money won in the jackpot that was rigged.

The case is not about greed, only right and wrong.

Exactly!  The main sticking point I can see so far for Lucky Larry is that if Tipton did not rig the drawing, then some other numbers would have been drawn — but Iowa can contend that someone else may have won that drawing with whatever non-rigged numbers were drawn.  So it's impossible to know for sure if Lucky Larry's jackpot would be larger or not.

I suppose Lucky Larry could say that based on the long string of previous drawings (60) that did not produce a jackpot winner, it is most likely that it would have rolled, but I'm not sure that's a bullet-proof legal argument.  It will be fun to watch!

" he would not have won anything if Eddie Tipton hadn't fixed the draw"  That's a bit of a stretch MW, why you ask? Because Eddie was only working the system to his advantage, he had no way of knowing whether a player or players chose the same numbers as he did. But it's a fun thought nonetheless.

"The Judge seems to be inclined to grant him his wish"

Based on what I've seen the judge was just ruling on matters of law, and any opinion he has about the actual merits are irrelevant.

"Well tables got turned and those Attorneys got sued for defamation."

And how did it turn out? Even if Dawson had said that the Iowa lottery is a bunch of thieving lowlifes that are deliberately ripping off the players I doubt he'd win. We know that at least one of the games was rigged and the lottery hasn't paid that prize to anybody so there's legitimate debate about whether or not the claim would be true. More importantly if he said anything that's determined to be defamatory I think there's a pretty good argument that the lottery is a public figure. In that case simply saying something defamatory doesn't meet the legal requirements. The lottery would need to establish that he acted with either malice or a disregard for the accuracy of his claims.

"If the jackpot had been millions higher, the state would have sold more tickets and there could have been a winner earlier than Larry's win."

I can't understand why any of the people posting here don't immediately recognize that if the $16 million had rolled over the higher jackpots would have increased sales and therefore increased the chances of somebody winning before Dawson. As it turned out the two jackpots totaled $25 million, but building on the $16 million rollover would have resulted in a jackpot of more than $25 million.

"It is a bit of speculation, but I'm sure the state can find some expert to testify to it."

The only thing that's speculative is who would have won and when. Calculating the chances of somebody else winning before Dawson did totally straightforward. The lottery knows to a reasonable accuracy how many tickets would have been sold for each subsequent jackpot, and that tells them how likely a winner would be for each subsequent drawing. It wouldn't be fair to simply use the likely sales to calculate Dawson's chances because there wasn't a 100% chance of anybody winning when he won, but it might make sense to look at how much his chances would have been decreased. Just pulling numbers out of my ass, but if there was a 40% chance of producing a winner by the drawing he won and there would have been a 90% chance if the jackpot had rolled we could figure there would have been a 4 in 9 chance that his would still be the first winner. I see three possible solution based on the probability. One is that he would have won a smaller jackpot, but they certainly can't take any money back. The second is that he's entitled to 4/9 of the $25 million total, in which case he'd be entitled to another $2.1 million. Finally there's an argument that he'd be entitled to 4/9 of the bigger jackpot that would have resulted.

Of course the problem the lottery faces with that argument is that it acknowledges that the lottery owes some amount of money to Dawson, along with the corollary that they owe at least $16 million to players in general. The problem is that if the lottery just sticks to their claim that the alternate reality is uncertain I think a jury is likely to figure that the money would have gone to somebody and that somebody is Dawson.

"There are lots of bitter folks out there."

I'm guessing that's exactly who he wants on the jury. See the usual comments when somebody has a ticket that seems to be winner but gets invalidated due to some printing error, and the post after yours: "Personally I hope he wins and the lottery pays out triple + lawyer fees."

"I think a jury is likely to figure that the money would have gone to somebody and that somebody is Dawson."

Eddie rigged more than one drawing, but the lottery kept the money from this one. And I'm pretty sure because of that Dawson's lawyers are going to try and make a case similar to yours. But making that case depends on getting the jury to focus on who won instead of could win. The lottery will argue because they did not know the December 29, 2010 drawing was rigged and that winner didn't come forward until seven months after Dawson won his jackpot, they can't be negligent at least for that. 

There is one more kicker because the cash value of the $16.5 million jackpot was distributed to the participating states. Iowa's portion was returned to the players in the form of a Mystery Millionaire promotion. 

DELotteryplyr probably summed it up best by saying "By the judge letting it move forward this allows the continued discussion and analysis of this issue." And I don't recall any rules requiring a law degree to discuss and analyze lottery lawsuits on a lottery message board.

and it will be years before the "Eddie Tipton" story is over.

I think this lawsuit is going to open up a whole can of worms. If Lucky Larry should win, other people who won a jackpot however many drawings immediately after a Tipton rigged win, will argue that their jackpot win would have been higher too if the previous win hadn't been rigged.

This is gonna be good!!! 

I think anything that potentially  broadens the rights of players, especially where the state lottery causes the fraud, is a good thing.

Remember that the woman in New Hampshire with her lawsuit regarding anonymity, seems to have lit a fire on the broader issue of the right to remain anonymous in multiple states.

Facts in cases often win. 

Speculation is often dismissed. So stick to the facts. 

He is asking that the funds from the fraudsters payout be now re allocated to him . 

Cause and effect.

Good point. I'm not totally sympathetic to Lucky Larry's claim, but if he manages to win or get a settlement out of the lottery, it's a win for all lottery players in the long run.

If Tipton’s bogus win had been caught immediately, the money would have rolled over, and the jackpot would have been much higher than it was when Larry won, if it hadn’t been hit by that time.  More tickets would have been sold, so there would be a greater chance that it would be hit sooner. But, who is to say that It couldn’t have been Larry that still hit it?

Knowing the circumstances of the money that they did not pay out to Tipton, the Lottery should have held onto the money and maybe even invested it somehow until sufficient time ran out on any potential lawsuits.

The only possible legitimate claim to that money is the person who won the next jackpot.  Tipton did not let the time limit expire when he tried to claim it, which would be the only way, under the lottery’s rules, to let it go back to the states. If the jackpot had not been hit before the case against Tipton was finalized, the money could have been put back into the jackpot.  Because it was hit, does not automatically mean the states now have a right to it.

Also, how many times do people say that only playing when the jackpot is insanely high is stupid when you consider a small jackpot is still life changing, and the odds of winning are still the same no matter how high the jackpot is.  People who didn’t buy tickets after it was announced that someone hit it(Tipton), couldn’t claim they could have won, and those that did buy tickets, cannot show that their claim to a share is better than the next jackpot winner.

"the Lottery should have held onto the money and maybe even invested it somehow until sufficient time ran out on any potential lawsuits."

Dawson won his jackpot before Tipton's ticket expired. The prize money was returned to the participating states by the rules. Iowa held a drawing for it's share of the pot. It's obvious MUSL didn't know that drawing was rigged until years after they distributing the prize money.

Dawson's lawyers will probably contend MUSL knew something was wrong when Crawford Shaw validated the ticket for the Hexam Investments trust just two hours before the ticket expired. Shaw met with lottery officials two weeks later but refused to identify members of the trust. And this story proves the Iowa Lottery knew something was wrong. 

The outcome will be very interesting.