The lotto winner’s death reported over the weekend stunned many, as the sudden demise of Amanda Clayton seemed to fit the pattern many believe exists involving lotto winners and subsequent heartache after scoring the big jackpot.

The lotto winner’s death of an apparent drug overdose was noteworthy after many came to know Amanda Clayton following a scandal in which she was outed by local news for continuing to receive food stamps and assistance after scoring a large lottery jackpot in Michigan.

Given the contentious debate surrounding welfare alone in the US, Clayton’s story became polarizing, and many called for local authorities to throw the book at the young woman. The lotto winner’s death came as a shock after she came to national prominence following the food stamps lottery scandal, but her lawyer says that the fraud case that followed was a massive stressor for the young jackpot winner.

The lotto winner’s death will certainly be linked in popular parlance with the supposed lotto curse that many believe accompanies such windfalls, and a local news source quotes a neighbor in saying that Clayton, 25, never was in any sort of trouble before she won the lottery:

“We moved in here around the same time, so I’ve know her since she was a little girl … She was a nice, pleasant girl who never got in trouble, until she won the lottery.”

Clayton’s lawyer concurs, speculating that the lotto winner’s death followed a tremendous amount of stress for the young woman who was thrust into the spotlight not as a lucky lotto winner but as a criminal:

“This case weighed on her and affected her … I think the public scrutiny was something she didn’t have the proper tools to deal with. … To know how her shoes were pinched exactly is speculation, but you know it had to be heavy.”

The lotto winner’s death is being treated as accidental and not a suicide.

Lotto Winner Death Furthers Lottery Curse Myth, Lawyer Says Fraud Charges Weighed Heavily On Amanda Clayton is a post from: The Inquisitr