A lottery winner

About 20 years ago I was in the district clerk’s office in Clarksville, Texas, looking at 1830s and 1840s court cases when Carolyn, one of the assistant clerks, said there was a very interesting divorce case going on. I said I hadn’t heard about it. She said, “Well, this Arkansas man won the Texas lottery, $5 million paid out over 20 years. When he got his first payment, he bought a double-wide for him and his girlfriend and one for her mother. You know Arkansas has a state income tax, so when they billed him, he moved to Annona.” (Texas does not have an income tax. Annona is a small town in Red River County.) She went on: “He bought a house in Annona, and I’ll tell you whoever sold him the house saw him coming.”

“He paid too much?” I said.

“I’ll say he did. Anyway, he moved in with his girlfriend, her mother, her two sons, about 6 and 8, and her teenage daughter. He married his girlfriend, and after a while, I guess she decided she didn’t like Texas all that much and wanted to go back to Arkansas. He was looking at the money he’d lose, so he said no way. So, she filed for divorce and she wants a whole bunch of money for child support. Anyway, there’s a hearing going on today, and I thought you might be interested.” I told her “Thank you” and that I would take a listen.

I went upstairs to the court room. A woman I figured the wife was at the witness stand. She was an average size woman, blonde, and wearing jeans and a sleeveless blouse. She had a long tattoo on her upper left arm.

The defendant’s lawyer was questioning the woman. “You say your husband should pay you (several) thousand dollars a month for support while you find a job in Arkansas, is that correct?” The woman said it was. The lawyer said, “How do you plan on getting to job interviews?” The woman said she had a couple of cars. The lawyer said, “What cars do you have?” The woman said she had a 1966 Mustang. The lawyer interrupted. “Your husband bought you the 1966 Mustang?” The woman said, “Yeah, he did.” The lawyer then asked about her other transportation. She said she had a 1969 Chevrolet Camaro, a GMC van and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle. Yes, she said, her husband had bought those for her.

The lawyer then asked why she thought her husband should pay (several) thousand dollars a month support. The wife said, “Well, I got my mother, two sons, my daughter and her boyfriend living with me.” The lawyer informed the woman that her husband was not responsible for supporting her mother and her daughter’s boyfriend. “Oh,” the woman replied.

The lottery winner was up next. His wife’s lawyer asked what his yearly income was. He replied, “Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.” The lawyer asked, “But before you get that lottery check, don’t you borrow that much from a bank every year?” “Yeah,” the man said. “They know I’m good for it.” The lawyer said, “I have a hard time imagining somebody spending two hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year.” The man said, “Shoot, when I got that first check, I spent it in a month.”

Those were the most interesting parts of the hearing. At the end of the day, the judge said he would take further information at a date to be set by the district clerk.

After court let out, Carolyn, the assistant clerk, said, “Did you see that tattoo the woman had?” I said I had seen a tattoo, but I couldn’t tell what it was. In a shocked voice, she said, “Bob, it was a d!ck!” I thought, Dang. She has a tattoo of a penis running from just above her elbow almost to her shoulder? I wondered why the judge did not tell the woman to cover up the tattoo.

That was the only day I sat in on hearings. I had not written about the trial from the beginning, and it made no journalistic sense to start now. A county constable later on told me he was acting as bailiff one day when the wife’s attorney asked the husband, “Is it true you have hidden ten thousand dollars in order to keep the money from your income figure?” “Yeah,” the husband said. The attorney informed the husband that hiding assets was against the law. He said, “Where is the money?” The husband said, “I’m not gonna tell you.” The lawyer looked at the judge. “Your honor?” he said. The judge looked at the husband. “Mister Smith, where did you hide the ten thousand dollars?” The husband said, “I’m not gonna tell you.” The judge said, “Mister Smith, I’m going to give you one more opportunity to tell where you hid the money before I find you in contempt of court.” The husband shook his head. “I’m not gonna tell you.” The judge then announced his contempt finding against the husband, and told the constable to take Smith to jail.

A few days later, the constable said to me, “He was grinning like a possum when I locked him up. He said, ‘When am I gonna get out?” I asked him what he meant. He said, ‘When are you gonna let me out?’ I told him God himself couldn’t get him out of jail. Only the judge could do that.” The constable laughed and said, “He decided real quick to tell the judge where the money was.”