Free Republic

(CNN) — A Florida mother won $2 million in the lottery, just days after she finished paying off her daughter’s cancer treatment. Geraldine Gimblet, a resident of Lakeland, won $2 million from a $10 scratch-off lottery ticket, according to a news release from the Florida Lottery. She claimed her winnings as a one-time lump-sum payment of $1,645,000 last Friday, the April 7 news release says. Gimblet told the Florida Lottery she bought the last lottery ticket at her local gas station. “At first, the gas station clerk thought there were no tickets left,” she recalled, according to the news release....

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested 212 people and served notices to businesses in the Los Angeles area, in a five-day operation that ended Thursday, the federal agency said. Of those arrested, 195 have criminal convictions, were issued final orders of removal but did not leave the country, or re-entered illegally after being removed, ICE officials said.

Floyd Mayweather has been cashing multi-million checks for his fights for more than a decade. He banked at least $25 million for each of his past nine bouts going back to 2007 when he defeated Oscar De La Hoya in the most watched fight in the history of boxing pay-per-view events. Mayweather has earned almost $400 million in the ring since he turned pro in 1996 after the Olympics, but he has never had a year like this past one. Mayweather earned $105 million during the past 12 months for 72 minutes of work in the ring for fights against...

Lindsay Binegar was 14 the first time she spent any winnings from years of showing hogs. She bought a purse. The second time, at 18, she splurged. She bought a four-bedroom, two-bathroom house with a two-car garage. And she paid in cash. "I've never heard of a teenager buying a house," said Nikki Gasbarro, spokeswoman for the Ohio Association of Realtors. "Smart girl." The Greenfield teenager has been saving money since she was 4 years old and won $100 showing a hog. "I didn't get the money; it went to the bank," said Binegar, now a 19-year-old freshman at Ohio...

VAN -- Jimmie Lovett, a homeless handyman from Boone County, took a chance, bought a $5 yellow rubber duck and won $10,000. The winner of last month's Charleston Sternwheel Regatta's Rubber Ducky Derby, the only title he's ever had, has since been sentenced to a year of home confinement for a June drunken driving arrest. In what seems like either a mocking twist of fate or a terrible case of bad judgment, Jimmie spent all his derby winnings buying his first home, a tiny ramshackle trailer in the middle of Boone County. He now says he can't afford to pay...