Caesars claims lottery winner wrote $1.5 million in bad checks

Thursday, June 08, 2006 posted 03:10 AM EDT

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. - After winning almost $315 million, it seems odd that lottery winner Jack Whittaker would have money troubles. But a court case has revealed an addition to the long list of Whittaker's problems since his windfall: Caesars casino is suing him, claiming he wrote bad checks.

The Atlantic City casino, owned by Harrah's Entertainment Inc., contends Whittaker wrote 21 checks totaling $1.5 million that bounced during gambling trips in 2004. Whittaker claims he doesn't owe the money because of agreements he had with the casino.

While the lawsuit was filed in May 2005, it didn't come to light until recently when a West Virginia lawyer subpoenaed the documents to use in an unrelated, wrongful death lawsuit against Whittaker.

The Press of Atlantic City reported on the casino lawsuit in Wednesday's newspapers.

Whittaker won the Powerball jackpot in 2002, which at the time was the largest undivided lottery jackpot, and since then has been beset by problems. He's been arrested for drunken driving, had hundreds of thousands of dollars stolen from him, and his granddaughter died of a drug overdose.

He's currently being sued by the father of a West Virginia boy, Jesse Joe Tribble, who was found dead in a home owned by Whittaker in Sept. 2004 and was an acquaintance of Whittaker's 17-year-old granddaughter who died a few months after Tribble.

Tom Peyton, a lawyer representing Tribble's father, recently filed subpoenas trying to get copies of surveillance tapes and other records related to Whittaker's gambling trips as part of the wrongful death lawsuit.

Whittaker denies that he's responsible for Tribble's death.

In response to Caesars lawsuit, Whittaker filed his own claims saying the casino actually owes him money because of agreements he had with the establishment to give him a percentage of revenue from a slot machine he developed and to give him a credit on his gambling losses.

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