2024-05-03 16:43:08
A resident of Sofia who won BGN 1 million from Vasil Bozhkov’s “scratching” lottery tickets is suing the parliament for the unpaid portion of his winnings – BGN 760,000 after the gambling operator’s license was revoked. The man lost the case in the first instance, a few days ago it became clear that he lost it in the second instance, but he has the opportunity to appeal to the Supreme Court.
Stancho T. bought a “Round the World” ticket in 2018 and it turned out that he won BGN 1 million. The organizer paid him BGN 200,000 on January 16, 2018, and BGN 40,000 on February 19, 2019 – the first of the 20 equal installments, on which the payment of the rest of the profit of a total of BGN 800,000 has been deferred over 20 years. After the National Assembly adopted on February 7, 2020 the Law on Amendments and Supplements to the Law on Gambling and the organizer of the lottery games “New Games” was left without a license, later went bankrupt and the resident of the capital was unable to receive the next installments of the profit – total BGN 760,000. The man claims that due to the changes in the law, he did not receive the rest of the amount won, and that is why he directed his claim to the parliament. It believes that because New Games’ main source of revenue has been taken away, the company has been declared bankrupt in January 2021, with an insolvency start date of February 27, 2020.
It claims that EU law, the principles of legal certainty, the protection of legitimate expectations, as well as the requirement to provide for a reasonable system of compensation and protection against the retroactive effect of legal norms have been violated.
However, he agreed to a deferred payment, over a period of 20 years, of part of the winnings, without foreseeing that changes in the financial position of the organizer of the lottery game might occur during this period.
The court is categorical that the Law affects the economic activity and the rights of the organizers of the lottery games, and does not affect the rights of citizens to receive the winnings. The only text on the rights of the winners is that the winnings that have not been paid before the entry into force of the law are paid according to the previous order.
Since the winning citizen is not affected by the adopted law, the court considers it pointless to check whether its acceptance is in breach of the principles of EU law. The check could be done if the claim is brought by a company to which the law applies. According to the claims of the winner that “New Games” went bankrupt as a result of the Law, it was not established in a definitive way that the withdrawal of the license to organize the lottery game became the reason for the bankruptcy of the company after 4 days of the Law coming into force. The court also adds that the opening of bankruptcy proceedings makes it difficult, but does not exclude the satisfaction of the claim of the winner of the prize money.
Stancho T. filed a claim against “New Games” for the same amount and the claims were accepted by the receiver and included in a list of unsecured claims. Thus, at the second instance, after the SGS, the Court of Appeal – Sofia rejected the claim. The decision is not final and can be appealed to the Supreme Court.