A man from Pennsylvania managed to find himself in $1million of debt just over a year after winning $16.2million in the lottery.
William ‘Bud’ Post III won the eye-watering sum in 1988, but found himself struggling a year later.
He splashed the money on luxury cars, motorcycles, planes he could not fly, mansions and family businesses.
When William bought his ticket, he had just $2.46 in his bank account and was on disability benefits.
He sold a ring for $40 and gave his then-girlfriend and landlady the money for 40 tickets in the state lottery.
He collected the first of his $497,953 annual payment after landing the win, but blew $300,000 of it in just two weeks.
Within three months he found himself in $500,000 worth of debt.
And matters got worse for him after his former landlady successfully sued him for a third of his winnings after they had agreed to split the winnings.
Making his story even more bizarre, his brother was accused of attempting to hire a contract killer to murder him in the hope of inheriting some of the money.
He eventually sold off many of his assets in the hope that he could live a somewhat normal life.
He was quoted in the Guardian saying: “Once I’m no longer a lottery winner, people will leave me alone. That’s all I want. Just peace of mind.”
But he spent the remaining $2.65million lottery winnings on two further homes, a truck, three cars, two Harley-Davidson motorcycles, two 62-inch Sony televisions, a luxury camper, computers and a $260,000 sailboat, dailymail.com reports.
He was later arrested on a luxury yacht in 1998 after refusing to turn himself into police over an assault conviction.
He had been found guilty at firing a shogun at a man collecting a debt at his mansion.
After being released from prison he lived on a $450-per-month disability check until his death in 2006.
He said in 1993: “Everybody dreams of winning money, but nobody realises the nightmares that come out of the woodwork, or the problems,’ he told a reporter in 1993.
“I was much happier when I was broke.”
