BUSAN, South Korea — A man filed suit in South Korea last week against his drycleaner to recover more than $1 million he allegedly would have won from a lottery ticket he left in a pants pocket.
A District Court in Busan will open an initial hearing tomorrow. The plaintiff, identified only as Mr. Song, filed suit for 1 billion won (about $1.1 million) against a local drycleaner, Mr. Kim. Song says he purchased the lottery ticket in February 2003, and left it in the pocket of a suit he sent to the cleaners.
Song claims he remembered the ticket after Kim’s wife notified him that she had found something “important” in a pocket. When he later asked about the ticket, however, Kim told him nothing had been found.
After hearing rumors that Kim had purchased a luxury sedan and other expensive items, Song started thinking that the lottery ticket might have been a winner. He filed suit for 100 million won in November 2006, later increasing the amount to 1 billion. Thirteen winners took away 83.5 billion won in cash in the corresponding drawing, or nearly $7 million each.
Song has formally petitioned the lottery’s operator, Kookmin Bank, for information about whether his signed ticket was cashed, and whether Kim claimed any prize money. The bank cited privacy concerns in rejecting previous requests for the information.
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