Can you cheat the lottery?

Well you’d think not but today we reported on 2 guys who thought they’d manage to swindle the lottery out of £4m and had the barefaced cheek to complain volubly to the press when they didn’t get the money and even going so far as to go to the police and sue Camelot.

The two men from Bolton with multiple convictions for a variety of offences headed off to London where they intended to go begging on Easter Monday 2019.

They later changed their plans after they used the bank account details of a third man, they had allegedly helped by paying a bill he had run up at a London brothel, to withdraw £90 from a chip and pin machine at a Londis store on Clapham High Street and later withdrew more funds which they used to buy £71 of shopping and a number of lottery scratch cards.

Included in the batch of cards was a £10 winner on which Waitrose as a Camelot partner,  promptly paid out.

However they hit the jackpot when a second card turned out to be worth £4m.

But when one of the men, JON ROSS WATSON phoned Camelot to tell them that his friend MARK GOODRAM had won the money which they would be sharing, he was told that the money would be made by bank transfer. At which point MARK GOODRAM explained that neither of them held bank accounts, which as the ticket had been sold using a bank debit card, raised a few eyebrows.

Notwithstanding this potential stumbling block the duo embarked on a spending spree downing copious quantities of wine, lager, vodka, Jack Daniels and, of course champagne.

Sitting on a bench outside the Waitrose branch in Clapham from where the winning ticket had been purchased the pair told reporters that they were partying like the millionaires they now were and Goodram announced that once he was in possession of a passport he would be heading off on a Caribbean cruise and then Las Vegas. They also had plans to buy luxury properties.

Unfortunately for them Camelot withheld the money pending investigations.

Watson said,”The Lottery catchline is ‘It Could Be You’. Well, it’s us but Camelot bosses are messing us around, probably because they know we’ve had a lively past and been in prison. Well, that’s too bad. They need to pay us what we’re owed or else!”

Father-of-two Goodram told The Sun: ‘We will go to the police to report Camelot. They are being unscrupulous.”

Meanwhile the reported owner of the card used to purchase the ticket, Joshua Addyman, initially only as “JOHN” came out of the woodwork to also claim the money.

So the dynamic duo hired controversial celebrity barrister Henry Hendron QC who promptly threatened to to sue CAMELOT for alleged breach of contract in the High Court.

The lawyer had only recently returned to practice after a three-year suspension for supplying recreational drugs that killed his teenage boyfriend Miguel Jimenez.

Hendron’s legal papers for Goodram and Watson claim the pair were homeless and had to use friends’ bank accounts to process Universal Credit payments.

Hendron claimed that the third man, Joshua Addyman was not entitled to withdraw permission “post transaction”, adding that even if he had it did not “invalidate my clients’ otherwise winning ticket”.

The writ continued, “The claimants had the full authority and authorisation of the account holder to use those funds for the purchase of the five scratch cards.”

It added that by allowing the £10 payout, Camelot accepted the validity of the scratch card and the contract entered into when it was bought.

But dad-of-one Watson said later: “I’d happily do a deal with the cardholder.

“We wouldn’t want to end up with nothing.

“That would be wrong.”

Dad-of-two Goodram added: “We’re surviving on the kindness of others.”

The lawyer previously told reporters : “My clients have been very open and upfront about their upbringing in care homes and hard struggles in life, including previous substance misuse problems, which both have tried really hard to overcome. Camelot is in effect holding my clients ransom to their past.

“My clients consider Camelot are behaving in a culturally racist way by subjecting them to a level of scrutiny, checking and vetting, they would not otherwise do if the person who claimed the prize spoke in a posh accent.”

Notwithstanding all this Camelot stated that paying out on the £10 winning card did not amount to acceptance that it was bought legitimately. The firm said: “The claimants are required to prove that they used the debit card with the account holder’s authority.”

Meanwhile Watson and Goodram were initially charged with two counts of fraud by dishonestly claiming they were entitled to use a debit card in the name of Joshua Addyman to make a purchase at a Londis convenience store and Waitrose in April 2019.

Although they initially denied these charges they eventually admitted their guilt and were finally jailed last week at Bolton Crown Court for 18 months.

Sentencing them, Recorder Sarah Johnston said the pair, who had numerous previous convictions, had deprived the next customer to win a “life-changing sum of money” before having the “audacity to plead your sense of injustice in the national newspapers”.

“You must have thought all of your Christmases had come at once,” she said.

“Despite knowing you had fraudulently acquired that prize money, you tried to claim it.

“I have no doubt that both of you will continue to offend in dishonest ways in the future.”

Now that’s what I really call barefaced cheek!

Later in today’s show we reported on a man who was enjoying a lovely day on the ocean near the Florida Keys when he came across a somewhat suspicious looking package floating in the sea.

He called police who after inspecting the contents discovered it to consist of over 30 kilograms of cocaine wrapped up in packages with a street value of more than $1m.

While you might find it bizarre that someone managed to stumble across a humungous shipment of drugs without any sign of the owner, it actually isn’t all that uncommon, especially in that part of America.

Earlier this year, a snorkeler discovered $1.5 million worth of cocaine in the Florida Keys.

I think we’ll leave it there and I hope to see you again tomorrow,
Scott