Lottery Winner Missing

We all love stories of rags to riches. Many of us have dreams that one day we will buy the lucky lottery ticket that will help us live our dreams. Oh sure we've all seen the stories of lottery winners who suffered personal and or financial downfalls after their big win. Still we are certain that if we were the lucky one, we would know how to avoid the problems.

Who doesn't remember Andrew Jackson "Jack" Whittaker, Jr.? He won $315 million and after taxes collected $113.4 million. You would like to believe his life would then be all sunshine and roses. Sadly he learned first hand the devastation his big win would bring his way.

He lost his granddaughter, whose body was found under a tarpaulin near her boyfriend's home. He was sued for wrongful death of a friend of his granddaughter and had to pay a multi-million dollar settlement. He had money stolen out of his vehicle, not once but several times, at a local strip club.

In January of 2007, Whittaker came forward to the police alleging that thieves had stole the remainder of his fortune. He stated that thieves, in a coordinated plan had cashed 12 checks effectively emptying his bank account.

Whittaker now claims to be struggling financially and barely able to make ends meet with the payouts from previous lawsuits. He has frequently stated that no amount of money lent to friends and family was ever enough and that his experiences with the lottery destroyed his life. He states that if he could do it all over again, he would have just filled up his tank, bought a sandwich and gone on his merry way.

There are some people who shake their heads at stories like this certain that this is something that never would have happened to them. Some people are secretly happy. Those kinds of people are happy at anyone's misfortune. There are other people who are of the idea that lottery wins are ill-gotten gains anyway and that any misfortune that falls upon the winner was well deserved. There are still others, like me, who have some sympathy for the human being who learned that money does not hold all the answers.

When I heard the story of Abraham Shakespeare who won $30 million in the Florida lottery in 2006 I felt truly sad.

It begins much like many other great stories do. A young man who is living a life with much to be desired. He's had been working a job making $8 an hour. He'd had some brushes with the law.

Then comes the fateful day when one lottery ticket changes his life. When he won he bought a Nissan Altima, a Rolex from a pawn shop, a $1 million home in a gated community. He talked about starting a foundation for the poor and insisted the money wouldn't change him.

His mother said he was generous, paying for funerals, lending money to friends starting businesses and even giving a million dollars to a guy known only as "Big Man."

Not long after he bought the million-dollar home in early 2007, he was approached by a woman named Dee Dee Moore, said family and officials.

Ms. Moore said she was interested in writing a book about Shakespeare's life. She became something of a financial adviser to Shakespeare, who never graduated high school.

According to The Ledger of Lakeland, the 37-year-old Moore contacted reporters at the newspaper in April, saying Shakespeare was "laying low" because people tried to suck money out of him.

His family reported him missing on November 9, according to the Polk County Sheriff's Office but he's actually had no contact with his family since April.

Police believe DeeDee Moore has information about Shakespeare.

The 37-year-old Moore is believed to have offered to give away a home worth about $200,000 in exchange for making a false report to law enforcement regarding an alleged recent sighting of Shakespeare.

Detectives also say Moore paid one of Shakespeare's relatives $5,000 to hand-deliver a birthday card containing cash to Shakespeare's mother suggesting the card was from her son.

Moore began using Shakespeare's cell phone in April 2009 to text the man's relatives and friends to have them believe it was Shakespeare attempting to contact them.

His mother said: "I hope so much he is alive somewhere and I want people to know if they ever win the lottery they know how to handle the people that come after them.

"They can be dangerous."

The sheriff's office is now making a public plea for information. It's also offering a $10,000 cash reward for anyone who can lead investigators to Shakespeare.