Posted on 11/27/2004 4:07:31 AM PST by DirtyHarryY2K
A Sad but True Texas Lottery Winner Story
Originally Posted: Nov 24, 2004 Revised:
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Less than two years after Billie Bob Harrell Jr. took the $31 million lottery jackpot, he took his own life Harrell, a former Pentecostal preacher, was a Home Depot stocker when he hit the jackpot.
Billie Bob's (Mis) Fortune
BY STEVE MCVICKER
Houston Press
From the Week of Thursday, February 10, 2000
Many have the same dream: finding the six magical numbers that unlock the treasure known as the Texas Lottery. Then life would be good. Problems would vanish. There are even the collective fantasies of what to buy and with whom to share this new, instant wealth.
Billie Bob Harrell Jr. shared those common visions by common souls seeking the salvation of sudden fortune.
And in June 1997, he found it.
He sat in his easy chair one evening and looked at his Quick Pick and then at the Sunday newspaper. Harrell studied the sequence of numbers again and began to realize the wildest of notions. He and wife Barbara Jean held the only winning ticket to a Lotto Texas jackpot of $31 million.
Harrell, a deeply religious man, knew he had a godsend from heaven. After being laid off from a couple of jobs in the past few years, Billie Bob had been reduced to stocking the electrical-supply shelves of a Home Depot in northeast Harris County. He was having a damn hard time providing for himself and Barbara Jean, much less for their three teenage children.
Every Wednesday and Saturday those kids were on his mind when he'd scrape together a few spare dollars to purchase a couple or so lottery tickets. Sometimes he'd use the sequence of his children's birth dates to choose his numbers. Other times he'd let the state's computer do his choosing for him. That random selection finally paid off, transforming Harrell into a millionaire overnight on a warm evening in June.
The hard times were history when he arrived in Austin about a month later, with an entourage that included his family, his minister and his attorneys, to collect the first of 25 annual checks for $1.24 million.
Life had been tough, he said at the formal lottery ceremony, but he had persevered through the worst of it.
"I wasn't going to give up," said Harrell, then 47. "Everyone kept telling me it would get better. I didn't realize it would get this much better."
In fact, it was great. At least for a while. Harrell purchased a ranch. He bought a half-dozen homes for himself and other family members. He, his wife and all the kids got new automobiles. He made large contributions to his church. If members of the congregation needed help, Billie Bob was there with cash.
Then suddenly Harrell discovered that his life was unraveling almost as quickly as it had come together. He relished the role of being an easy touch. But everyone, it seemed -- family, friends, fellow worshipers and strangers -- was putting the touch on him. His spending and his lending spiraled out of control. In February those tensions splintered his already strained marriage.
And on May 22, 1999, 20 months after hitting lottery pay dirt, Harrell locked himself inside an upstairs bedroom of his fashionable Kingwood home and stood at the point of no return. Investigators say he stripped away his clothes, pressed a shotgun barrel against his chest and fired.
Billie Bob Harrell was gone forever. So was the fortune, and even the family that had rejoiced with him when the shower of riches had first rained upon them. A schism has widened between the children and grandparents, who cannot even agree on whether Billie Bob took his own life. And an intrafamily war looms over the remnants of the fortune, which may not even be enough to pay estate taxes.
Perhaps the only thing not in dispute about his life and death is the jarring impact of money: It may not have caused his problems, but it certainly didn't solve them.
Shortly before his death, Harrell confided to a financial adviser: "Winning the lottery is the worst thing that ever happened to me."
Be prepared to be taken to task for your observation.
"Sounds like Texas doesn't pay out to survivors of deceased winners. Now THAT should be criminal."
Texas DOES continue to make the payments to the winner's estate.
I would disappear the day I picked up the check and every once in a while I would mail some money to the people I choose.I would do this for a few years before settling down again.
I wish that convenience stores were not little casinos, however--slows down my purchases of milk and soda.
It's depressing to be getting some chips and soda on a Friday afternoon. I get to watch a line of the poor, having rec'd their small paychecks, spend a chunk on the "stupidity tax." I think then of how shameful it is that the state exploits people this way...
Deliver the touch in a planned manner, early on. I'd think that'd make it easier to say "no" later.
Giving money to people isn't always helping.
Perhaps, but poor people who also have all those vices tend to be more readily involved in things that impoverish (or kill) their neighbors, and make you have to hire more police, and build more jails.
Invest all the money and live off the returns. A million will easily give you 150 k a year. If you can't live on that, take the shotgun route because bankruptcy is just down the road.
G-d loves idiots, too-He certainly made enough of them. Hopefully, when the poor fellow is called to account, some considration is given in that the person could not even manage his life well, before it was complicated by a windfall that he was helpless to manage.
How a Believer can commit suicide, I cannot guess at, though. If Life is a gift, and the gift is thrown back in the Giver's face..well.
Dante had some theories abou that.
True. But I'm sure that latte tastes a lot better than a losing lottery ticket! Your sister probably feels like a winner every day.
That is a sad story. If I ever win the lottery. Some money would go to God. Some to family. The rest is MINE! There would be a simple sign posted at the entrance to my property.
If you are found here at night.....you will be found here in the morning. :o)
This guy did everybody a favor it appears to me.
What is yer bellyache now?? Didn't he live long enough to give you the bucks you thought you had coming??
: Well, it would depend on WHY he was constantly being laid off. Quite often people who get laid off repeatedly do have something to cause them for getting laid off ... like talking back to the boss, coming in late everyday, not being able to take orders, etcetera.
Now there are some people who get laid off ... sometimes many times. But they usually right themselves and get back on track ... or they find a job that works for them. But the fact that this guy was constantly laid off ... and then kills himself when he can't manage the terrible tolls of winning the lottery, suggests that he may have had problems just managing his life.
This story was written in the hopes that future lottery winners would simplu give ALL of the proceeds back to the government, who after all, knows how to spend it better... /s
......as apposed to other taxes which are confiscatory? Give me lotteries any day.
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