Judge rules elderly Conn. woman doesn’t have to split $500K lottery prize with sister

Elderly Conn. sister can keep full lottery prize

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — A judge says an elderly Connecticut woman doesn’t have to share her half of a $500,000 lottery windfall with the sister who sued her over it.

Eighty-seven-year-old Rose Bakaysa and her 84-year-old sister, Theresa Sokaitis, have been fighting over the money in court since 2005. That was shortly after Bakaysa and their brother won the Powerball jackpot.

Sokaitis says they signed a notarized contract a decade earlier to split all gambling profits. Bakaysa says that deal ended in 2004 during a spat over a few hundred dollars.

New Britain Superior Court Judge Cynthia Swienton on Wednesday agreed with Bakaysa, ruling the contract ended during the argument.