Arkansas Lottery Winners $500K Dispute Ends with Split Ordered

An Arkansas judge has ruled this week in favor of a man who sued his boss over a disputed $500K lottery scratch-off win. 

Judge Xollie Duncan ruled that Jose Quinteros was part of a joint venture with Jorge Rivera Palma when the $500,000 winning Arkansas 200x scratch-off ticket was bought. 

Quinteros claimed that he and Palma purchased the tickets together in February 2022 from a Quick Mart store in Roger, Arkansas. Palma physically carried out the transaction, but Quinteros says the money used to buy the ticket was profit from a previous ticket the pair had bought together. 

He brought a lawsuit against Quinteros over the matter earlier this year.

Palma denied the claims, but Duncan rejected the defendant’s arguments and ruled that half the win be given over to Quinteros. 

The Win

On February 12, 2023, Quinteros and Palma entered the Quick Mart together. Surveillance footage showed Palma purchased two Arkansas 200x scratch-offs for a total of $40. He scratched them off with Quinteros, and then returned to buy four more with the $80 winnings.  

Out of those four, one was a $500,000 winner. Palma and Quinteros then drove to Palma’s nephew’s house, where Palma took it inside. He never came back outside. Later that day, Palma told Quinteros over the phone that they would cash the ticket together the next day. That never happened. 

The Dispute 

Quinteros’ lawsuit said he and Palma had verbally agreed to invest any winnings of less than $100 in more tickets, and split any bigger wins. 

It said Palma took the ticket to his nephew’s house, and asked him to cash it in without Quinteros’ knowledge or approval. 

Palma spoke in court and denied the claims. His cousin, Marco Corado Erazo, said he cashed the winning scratch-off in Little Rock. He then duly transferred the winnings to Palma and had no prior knowledge of Quinteros’ claim to half of it. 

Jon Brent Standridge, chief legal counsel for the Arkansas Lottery, was in court to testify on the case.

He said that unless the ticket was signed by either party, there is no way to tell who was telling the truth about the verbal agreement. But it was clear that both parties were verifiably present when purchasing the ticket and walked off together looking at it. 

He said that action suggested joint venture, and the judge clearly agreed. Duncan ruled in agreement with the plaintiff in Benton County court on Tuesday, and said that Quinteros was entitled to half the winnings.

In this case, that amounted to $177,750, as the $500,000 lump sum prize will fall to $355,500 after taxes. 

After the verdict, Quinteros’ attorney, Aaron Cash, said his client was happy with the end result. 

“We always believed our client was in a joint venture and are satisfied with the judge’s ruling,” he said, speaking to the Arkansas Democrat Gazette.

In a similar recent case of a high-stakes lottery dispute in Australia, a retired man went to court over an AU$5 million ($3.28 million) win dispute with his two former friends. 

In the end, the Sydney court judge ruled against the plaintiff, Alan Way. He agreed with the defendants that Way had left the three-person syndicate after a falling out just weeks before the big win. The plaintiff was found to have falsified diary entries relating to his payments into the syndicate.