程阳：美国密歇根州彩票中奖者匿名的论战
2012-09-17 11:16阅读：
程阳：美国密歇根州彩票中奖者匿名的论战
Michigan Senate bill lets lottery winners remain
anonymous
Sep 14, 2012, 8:45 am
LANSING, Mich. — Michigan winners of multistate lotteries —
such as the Lapeer man who won a $337 million Powerball jackpot —
could choose to remain anonymous, under a bill that passed a state
Senate committee Thursday.
Sen. Tory Rocca, R-Sterling Heights, said publicity
surrounding such windfalls makes winners too vulnerable to scam
artists and viol
ent criminals, not to mention grasping third cousins.
'The reasons range from the mundane to the fatal,' Rocca
said. Not only are there 'relatives popping out of the woodwork,'
but 'there are cases throughout the country of people being shot
and actually killed.'
The Senate Regulatory Reform Committee that Rocca chairs
passed his bill Thursday in a 6-0 vote with bipartisan support. The
bill now moves to the full Senate.
But the change faces opposition from the Michigan Lottery
Bureau. It says taking away the publicity generated by winners such
as Donald Lawson, 44, who in August opted for a lump-sum $224.6
million payout, would depress ticket sales.
Patrick Clawson of Flint, a legal investigator who advocates
for open government, told the committee that Rocca's proposed law
would violate a requirement of the state constitution that all
state financial records be open to public inspection.
'What we're talking about is public money,' Clawson
said.
'If they want to keep their names (from being) disclosed, let
them play the Mafia numbers racket.'
Rocca rejected the constitutional argument and said winners
of lotteries confined to the state of Michigan, as opposed to
multistate lotteries such as Powerball, already have the option of
keeping their names secret.
Rocca noted that a $30 million lottery winning was cited as
the motive in the 2010 murder of a Plant City, Fla., man found
buried under a concrete slab.
