CHASE THE ACE WINNER VOWS TO SUE NEPHEW.
Family clashes over $1.2M draw prize
Barbara Reddick went to the firehall in Margaree Forks, N.S., on Thursday afternoon expecting a big novelty cheque for $1.2 million. Her nephew, Tyrone MacInnis, went there too, expecting the same.
In the parking lot, she says, she asked the 19-yearold to sit in her car with her. She wanted him to look her in the eye and tell the truth, or what she believes to be the truth, that she never promised to split her winnings with him.
But MacInnis and his parents insisted he was entitled to half, Reddick says. So on Thursday, after posing for photos with the big cheque, the feud between an aunt and her nephew erupted in a painfully public way, with Reddick vowing to sue the teenager in front of a pack of news cameras.
“I’m taking him to court. It was my ticket,” she shouted. “Now he’s trying to lie and say I said split.”
According to Reddick, she sent MacInnis $100 via email transfer to buy her tickets for the Chase the Ace draw, a fundraiser for two volunteer fire departments in Margaree.
She said she told him to put his name on the ticket beside hers only for luck, not because they planned on splitting any winnings. They’d been through this routine before with a weekly 50/50 draw in Glace Bay and, Reddick says, there seemed to be some magic in her nephew’s name.
“He’s always lucky with his draws, right?” said Reddick, a 57-year-old retired military supply tech. “I said ‘Well, put your name on the ticket and you’ll be my good luck charm.’ ”
“I didn’t say split. I never mentioned money at all.”
On Wednesday night their ticket won the draw.
Reddick got a call at home in Guysborough with news that she and MacInnis had won. “I said, ‘No I won! It was my ticket.’ ”
On Thursday, Reddick said she asked MacInnis how much money he was expecting from the jackpot. MacInnis, she said, expected to split the pot. His parents got involved, saying his name was on the ticket and he was entitled to half, according to Reddick.
“Tyrone is getting nothing from me,” she said. “It’s just for the principle. We were so close. He broke my heart. He broke it . ... People go crazy when it comes to money.”
Reddick went into the hall and stood beside her nephew, holding the novelty cheque for the assembled news cameras.
Bernice Curley, the organizer, handed each a cheque for $611,319. “It wasn’t pretty,” Curley said after.
The cheque for only half caught Reddick off guard. The reporters started asking questions about how she felt, and Reddick announced she was getting a lawyer and taking the young man to court.
“I’ll never speak to him,” Reddick said, “in this lifetime or the next.”