- Free legal advice on the internet is, shall we say, bad?
And unfortunately, some of the worst takes
come from one of my favorite places on the internet,
Reddit's rslash legal advice.
And of course, on the other hand,
anyone with an internet connection
knows the best headlines always begin with Florida Man.
So what happens when you combine
the subreddit legal advice and Florida?
Well, it gets interesting.
(bright music)
And today's episode of bad legal advice
comes from Reddit user Clean Transportation
who shares her own Florida man story.
She writes, "Regular customer tipped me
scratch tickets for years.
I finally won something
and they're threatening legal action
because I don't want to give them a cut."
Florida (chuckles) of course.
"I worked as head bartender for a local restaurant
for a number of years,
and there was a regular customer
who was there very frequently.
I interacted with this customer frequently,
they tipped exclusively in scratch tickets
and specifically called to ask for my schedule,
asked me out on multiple occasions, et cetera.
Probably about 40 years my senior.
If you've ever watched "The Good Place,"
this guy is IRL Brent.
- It's all about taking personal responsibility.
I don't know if people do that.
- Now, okay, so this isn't exactly legal advice
but just general life advice,
please don't ask out your bartenders who were just working,
don't mistake their professional courtesy
for genuine interest.
And if a person has already said
they aren't interested in the first time,
they typically aren't charmed if you ask them repeatedly.
I hate to be the one to tell you this,
but '80s movies kinda lied to you,
persistence in the face of no
isn't romantic in this day and age, it's creepy.
So come on, let's just not do that.
But I digress, back to the post.
"I won something from the scratch ticket
that Wasn't five, $10.
The final amount after taxes
was about three months salary for me
and I was making good money.
I specifically didn't tell the customer
not because I thought they would want it,
but because I didn't want them feeling
like I owed them something,
or that I should be thankful towards them.
I did tell a coworker
and it got to him through the grapevine.
Next time I came in, he congratulated me
and asked me how we wanted to split it.
I sternly told him that it was my tip and long story short,
he went to my manager who took his side.
I quit, had been planning to anyway,
since I'm about to finish school,
my manager gave this guy my email.
I'm curious about the legality of this too,
and he, the customer emailed me saying
that if I didn't agree to give him 50%,
he'd take legal action."
So, here we have a female employee
dealing with a bar patron
who has repeatedly declared a romantic interest in her,
which is not reciprocal,
threatens a lawsuit over a tip ticket,
and after all of that,
the manager gives the bar patron her email address.
This is what we call in the legal profession,
a total (beep) move,
it's also the same in bird culture.
But this probably isn't illegal.
I know this isn't the main part of the story,
but she's asking for legal advice here
and I just have to sink my teeth into this one.
So aside from information classified as confidential
like an employee's medical history,
the disclosure of most employee personal information
to third parties is largely unregulated.
Many employers regularly share
their employee's personal information
with third party vendors to run background checks,
to outsource administrative functions, and so on.
In Florida, which does have a right to privacy
written into its state constitution,
does not have any specific laws
that would prevent an employer
from providing an employee's personal information.
And Florida laws against invasion of privacy,
like intrusion or publication of private facts,
typically requires showing
that the disclosure of such information is offensive,
or goes beyond all possible bounds of decency.
So it's not clear that the manager giving out
an employee's email to a patron,
even one threatening to sue her,
meets the offensiveness standard.
And finally, another standard caveat when I do these things,
this could totally be fake, I don't know.
This could be completely made up, I don't really care.
This is fun to talk about,
it's an interesting legal issue.
But anyway, back to the putative Reddit post.
"Do I need to worry about taking his threat seriously?
Is there anything that I can or should do to protect myself?
I'm assuming this is a bluff
but I wanna have my bases covered.
TL;DR me drink lady, mean man who by many drinks
give me a scratchy scratchy," okay, we get it.
So she is worried that this guy is going to sue her
for some or all of the lottery winnings.
And this can be a complicated issue.
Believe me, anytime the lottery is involved,
lawyers are not far behind,
there is a long history of lottery law out there.
But before we dive into this complicated, legal mess,
let's check in with the comments
to see if any of these Redditors
offered some good legal advice.
And in fact, xShadey writes, "Mmm, oong like green paper.
Oong buy dizzy drink with green paper, oong happy."
Yeah, so that's pretty much
about the quality of legal advice
that you're likely to get
when you ask for free advice on the internet.
It's basically random postings
from the "Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer."
- Your world frightens and confuses me.
- And that might be reason enough alone
for this redditor to retain counsel
because in America, of course,
you can sue anyone at any time over just about anything.
And even if a lawsuit is completely meritless,
you still have to defend the case.
But here since the "Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer" is unavailable,
RIP Phil Hartman, this Redditor could hire a lottery lawyer.
Yes, that's right,
there actually is a thing called lottery law.
A lottery lawyer can help navigate tax laws,
keep your identity anonymous when you claim your prize,
and defend you from potential lawsuits
over the winnings like this potential lawsuit.
Because winning the lottery can turn into a messy battle
that ruins friendships, tears apart families,
and explodes into costly lawsuits.
And this is especially the case
where you have the dreaded workplace lottery pools.
For example, in 2012,
12 co-workers in Illinois won $118 million
and they were sued by 11 of their other colleagues
who claimed that they were in the pool and demanded a share.
It took three years and six law firms to settle the case
with the original 12, getting $6 million each,
and six others splitting $13.8 million
but no one got a penny of that until the case was resolved.
And similarly, in 2009,
five construction workers in a lottery pool
sued when the sixth co-worker
took a $38.5 million jackpot,
quit his job, and then disappeared.
A judge ordered the defendant
to surrender $20 million to the five former co-workers.
That's why lottery lawyers
recommend all workplace lottery pools
have a sharing agreement in writing,
because just like Biggie says more financial remuneration,
more judicial proceedings and legal ramifications.
But let's dive back into the comments
maybe there's something else that's better in here.
For example, SignUpAccountz writes,
"If you get sued, then you'll need to show up
and comply with any judge's orders," fair enough.
"But right now you owe him nothing
and don't even have a responsibility to reply to his emails.
Do save them just in case you get sued though,
but if he is threatening litigation
I would recommend ceasing all contact
from this point forward without an attorney present."
And this is technically correct.
- You are technically correct, the best kind of correct.
- Typically, you have no legal obligation to respond
to pre-litigation demand letters threatening a lawsuit.
And if the bar patron hasn't even retained a lawyer,
this could just be an empty threat.
And then another Redditor, Meowzebub chimes in helpfully,
"And just to clarify why this is important.
If this guy files a lawsuit against the Redditor,
which he is completely entitled to do
regardless of the lack of legal basis for the claim,
she needs to show up or be ruled against by default."
And these comments are interesting
because they're not really getting to the heart
of the substantive issue,
but they are really interested in civil procedure
and you know, they're not wrong.
And it's important to note
that a plaintiff isn't entitled to file a meritless lawsuit.
If a plaintiff files a lawsuit
that they know has no legal basis whatsoever,
they can be subject to sanctions.
But as we see time and time again,
people will often file these meritless suits
and avoid sanctions
because it's rare for judges to take that extra step,
and it's hard to weed out the lawsuits that have merit
from the ones that are completely meritless
at the first stages.
But Meowzebub, who has a hilarious username,
does make a very important point.
Even if the case is complete nonsense,
you still have to defend yourself from the lawsuit
otherwise you could lose automatically by default.
- I guess you're the winner by default.
- Default, woo-hoo!
- When a person is sued and served
with an official court summons in a complaint,
the defendant only has a limited amount of time
to file a response, either what's called a motion to dismiss
or a formal answer to the complaint.
If a defendant fails to file any response
or otherwise abandons the case,
the plaintiff can request the court
enter what's called the default judgment
against the absencee defendant.
So that's why it's so incredibly important
to be actually represented by counsel
if you are formally sued.
But back to the crux of this Reddit post,
the central question
is whether there is enforceable contract
between the bar patron and the bartender
to split the ticket winnings.
And this is really important because most people assume
that a contract has to be written,
but that's actually not the case,
only a small number of contracts must be in writing.
And in fact, sometimes there can even be an implied contract
based on the actions of the individuals.
So it's not nearly as cut and dry as it would appear.
In fact, generally speaking,
a contract doesn't have to be in writing to be enforceable,
as both written contracts and oral contracts can be valid.
In fact, most lottery lawsuits are based exclusively
on oral agreements to share winnings,
because people don't often write down their contracts,
and you know, that keeps lawyers employed.
But all enforceable contracts must have an offer,
an acceptance of that offer, and consideration.
An offer is usually a specific proposal
to enter into an agreement with another.
Acceptance of that offer is an assent to the bargain
which can either be expressed, like signing an agreement,
or implied by conduct.
And consideration is performance or a return promise
for which the party to the contract has bargained.
In order to constitute a bargain for consideration,
both sides must negotiate some benefit and/or detriment
from one another in exchange for the promises to perform.
However, a gift promise, like a tip,
lacks these required elements.
When you promise someone a gift, there's no formal offer,
there's no offer to accept, and there's no consideration.
A gift promise is not an invitation to bargain
because the promiser is offering something
without demanding anything in return.
Since no exchange is sought by the promising party,
there's no consideration.
So for example, a court would not enforce
a bear promise to a friend
that if the promiser ever won the lottery,
then the lottery winnings would be shared equally
between the friends,
thus a gift promise doesn't create an enforceable contract.
And this was essentially the conclusion
of a lawsuit against Tonda Dickerson,
an Alabama Waffle House waitress
who received a Florida lottery ticket as a tip
that won $10 million.
Two years after winning, Edward Seward,
the man who left the lottery ticket as a tip,
sued Dickerson and her coworkers
to recover the entire $10 million prize.
In his complaint, Seward alleged Dickerson
had promised to buy him a truck with any lottery winnings,
she didn't do that,
and thus Seward was claiming to be a victim
of fraudulent misrepresentation.
But instead of seeking to recover just the truck,
Seward demanded that the court
invalidate the tip on the grounds of fraud,
and award him the entire $10 million lottery winnings.
The trial court ruled against Seward
holding that the tip ticket was an unconditional gift
and found no evidence of fraud.
And in support of their ruling,
the court found the Dickerson
had made no misrepresentations to Seward
before she received a lottery ticket.
Seward gave Dickerson the ticket
without previously discussing what would happen if she won,
not on this occasion, nor on any previous occasion
of tipping the Waffle House employees with lottery tickets,
and Dickerson never requested a lottery ticket from Seward
rather, he just gave it to her freely
and without expectation.
And of course, Seward did not limit his damages to the claim
that he was entitled to a new truck,
but was claiming the entire $10 million prize,
which probably didn't help his case all that much.
Seward appealed his case
to the Alabama Supreme Court and lost.
So this Reddit case seems to be pretty similar
to the Seward case,
both Seward and the Reddit bar patron
had a pattern of leaving lottery as tips for servers.
There's no indication that either patron
discussed sharing the proceeds
from winning tickets with their servers,
and there's no indication
that the servers fraudulently misrepresented
that they would share the winnings
to induce the patrons to leave the lottery tickets as a tip.
So based on these facts,
it doesn't seem like the bar patron
has any right to share in the Redditor's winnings.
Now, maybe the Redditor is holding back.
If there was a discussion,
if there was an oral contract,
that could change the facts of this case.
By the way, this is what lawyers do all the time.
We analogize to old cases,
and we in comparison to the cases before us.
So whether it's Reddit, or whether it is an actual lawsuit
this is the kind of stuff that we do every day.
And there are certainly facts
that this Redditor might have left out from the post
that could change this outcome.
But, based on what we know, I'm sorry to the bar patron
but you are not entitled to anything
from the lottery winnings.
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So do you agree with my analysis?
Leave your objections in the comments
and check out this playlist over here
where I tackle all the things that people get wrong
about the law on the internet,
including and especially on Reddit.
So click on this playlist or I'll see you in court.