Man claims ex dumped him weeks after they bought winning £1,000,000 scratchcard

A former couple are at war over a £1,000,000 lotto win (Picture: Facebook)

A couple are waging war over a £1 million lotto scratchcard they ‘purchased together’ weeks before breaking up.

Michael Cartlidge, 39, and former partner Charlotte Cox, 37, purchased the Lottery card together at a shop in Spalding, Lincolnshire.

But when Charlotte walked out on Michael a few weeks later, she was deemed to be the sole winner of the jackpot by lottery chiefs.

Michael admits that Charlotte both paid for and scratched the ticket. But he also claims that he was the one who suggested she buy the ticket and attempted to transfer her cash to cover the purchase while they were in the shop.

Michael Cartlidge and Charlotte Cox broke up weeks after winning a lotto jackpot (Picture: Facebook)

He says the mum-of-one initially agreed to split the cash, but later welched on the deal after breaking up with him a few weeks later and claimed she was the sole winner of the jackpot.

A source told The Sun: ‘£1million has never brought such misery.’

Security engineer Michael, from Spalding, Lincs, told the publication he has a right to half the cash and is poised to launch legal action.

He said: ‘I am in shock. I can openly admit that we wouldn’t have got that ticket without Charlotte, but she wouldn’t have got it without me either.

‘I know it was her bank account that paid for it, but it should go 50-50 morally.’

But Charlotte later hit back at her exes ‘rubbish’ claims, with a source telling the publication her former partner had ‘no right’ to the jackpot. 

They added: ‘One million pounds has never brought so much misery.

Charlotte later claimed Michael had no right to the cash (Picture: Facebook)

‘It’s ruined the last three months for her and her family.’

The couple had been together for three months before the lotto drama started.

On the night of the win, the pair decided to pop to their local Lidl to buy duck pancakes for dinner.

Michael claims he suggested going to the Nisa next door to buy a couple of £5 scratchcards, but Charlotte balked at the idea as she didn’t have the money to pay for it.

‘She said she didn’t have the money to spend on scratchcards, but I said I’d transfer her the money,’ he said.

‘We were in the shop and I went on my Halifax app because I didn’t have my bank card.

‘I started the transfer, I held it up to show her. You can see me doing this on the shop CCTV, which Camelot has.

Michael says he is ‘ready to fight’ the case (Picture: Facebook)

‘The signal was bad so it didn’t go through at the time in the shop, it was just in the process of transferring. The little loading circle was going round.

‘She bought the two tickets on her card and when we got home she scratched it.’

To their amazement, one of the Dice Towers scratchcards landed them the £1million jackpot. Michael said: ‘We couldn’t believe it. We were in a state of shock. It was mad really.

‘I opened my app up about 40 minutes later and it pinged as it completed the transfer.’

The duo then spent the evening celebrating their win and taking pictures of the scratchcard, including one of Michael holding it.

But after initially making plans to put the money in a joint account and buy a house with it, things turned sour a few weeks later when Michael received a phone call from one of Charlotte’s friends telling him she was breaking up with him and that he needed to leave the house.

He did- and took the scratch card with him.

Michael told the Sun that things had started to get ‘fishy’ and he felt Charlotte was ‘up to something’. 

So he decided to take the scratchcard and stay at his mother’s house.  

Upon returning home, Ms Cox realised the card had been taken and got in touch with Camelot to get help with the situation.

Following some mediation, in which representatives from Camelot travelled to Lincolnshire to interview the pair separately about the dispute, they were able to get the ticket back. 

Michael later spent Christmas with Charlotte and believed the issue was behind them.

But on February 10, less than two weeks since new owner Allwyn took over the running of the National Lottery, he was sent a letter saying he was not entitled to any money. 

Michael now insists he is ‘ready to fight’.

But Charlotte insists that his case is ‘rubbish’, with a friend of hers telling The Sun: ‘You can’t believe a word that man says.’

According to Allwyn’s rules, only the name written on the back of the ticket can claim the prize. 

It told The Sun: ‘The National Lottery Rules for Scratchcard Games make clear that only one person can be the owner of a ticket and that only the person whose name and address is written on the back of a winning scratchcard can claim a prize. This means that a prize can only be paid to one person and this is always communicated clearly to prize claimants. 

‘Where a claimant agrees to share a prize with other parties (for example, players in a syndicate) after the prize has been paid, we always recommend that a legal agreement is drawn up between the interested parties.

‘If there is no agreement in place, any dispute between the ­parties needs to be resolved between themselves.’

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *