S.Ct.Civ.No. 2009-0066

The Court holds that, when an individual purchases a lottery ticket, the purchaser agrees to the Lottery's rules and regulations. Accordingly, because the Lottery's rules and regulations only place a duty on the Lottery to immediately pay a prize upon establishing the legitimacy of the winning ticket-without any regard to whether the individual bearing the ticket is the same individual who purchased it-the Lottery did not, in the absence of a lost or stolen prize claim, breach its contract with the plaintiff by immediately paying the grand prize to another individual who provided it with the winning ticket. Moreover, although the Lottery's rules and regulations require its executive director to pay checks for all major prizes, the Superior Court did not err in holding that the Lottery's failure to follow this procedure was not the proximate cause of the plaintiff's damages because the Lottery would not have been placed in the position of paying the grand prize to an individual other than the plaintiff if the plaintiff had not relied on a private notice without official character.