The High Court ordered Mary Walsh to pay David Walsh €564,065.66 from a €3,389,794 National Lottery prize, finding that he was entitled to a one-sixth share. The court also dismissed her counterclaim seeking to have a house transferred to him treated as held on trust for her.
The dispute concerned a ticket that won the jackpot on 22 January 2011. Six people signed the ticket and the prize claim form: Peter Walsh, his widow Mary, their son David, Kevin Black, and Mary’s sons Anthony and Jason Daly. Mary collected the prize as the nominated recipient. She argued that she was the sole winner and that the other names were added so she could make tax-exempt gifts. David claimed an equal share.
Justice Richard Humphreys found that the ticket had been bought as a joint exercise by Mary and Peter, and that Peter had discussed sharing lottery winnings with David. The judge accepted David’s evidence that his father told him he would receive his share. He found that the six signatories constituted a syndicate and that Mary and Peter’s signatures on the claim form acknowledged David’s co-ownership.
The judge rejected Mary’s account that David had been offered a choice between €200,000 and the house. He found no agreement that the house was transferred in place of a share of the lottery prize. Instead, the evidence supported an unconditional gift of the house to David. The counterclaim therefore failed.
The court held that Mary held one-sixth of the winnings on trust for David, finding an express trust and, alternatively, a constructive trust. It also found that her conduct precluded her from denying David’s part-ownership. The judge said her account of tax advice from a National Lottery representative had not been established on the balance of probabilities.
The judgment directed payment forthwith and awarded costs to David. It allowed a stay on enforcement for 28 days, continuing if an appeal was lodged within that period until the appeal was determined. The stay would take effect only if Mary lodged €929,965.66 in court, comprising the judgment sum and estimated costs. The order also barred her from reducing her assets below that amount. The judgment stated the payment order as €564,065.66, although the claim described in the judgment was for €564,965.66.