Odds and Ends

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - It took Robert G. Swofford Jr. more than a month to come forward and claim his $60 million Lotto prize, but he had to take care of some unfinished business - divorcing his wife.

Swofford, a postal worker from Seminole County, claimed his prize Tuesday in a $34.7 million lump sum payout, ending weeks of mystery about who won the Nov. 24 drawing.

Swofford, 53, and his wife separated three years ago. But two weeks after the winning numbers were announced, Ann Swofford served him with divorce papers and claimed a share of the prize.

Just before Christmas, the Swoffords and their lawyers hammered out an agreement. His wife will get $5.25 million and $1 million will be set aside to support their 11-year-old son. In return, she agreed not to seek any more of Swofford's winnings.

Swofford said he remembered reading about a divorce case where a lottery winner kept it a secret and was penalized in court.

"I'd heard of a case in California where a judge heard about it after he had settled the divorce case and took the husband to the cleaners and made him pay everything he had left out of his lottery winnings," Swofford said Tuesday.

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COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. - A man serving a life sentence for murder was sentenced to three additional years in prison for passing out cheese sandwiches while in jail.

Douglas Eugene Wilson, 45, pleaded guilty Monday to possession of contraband and was sentenced by District Judge Thomas Kane.

Prosecutors said Wilson had the sandwiches while in jail awaiting trial on the murder charge and he tried to give them to other inmates, which is a violation of jail rules.

A sheriff's deputy testified at a hearing in May that they warned Wilson not to pass food to other inmate then shocked him with a stun gun when he ignored them.

Wilson was tackled and handcuffed after he reportedly charged a deputy. Second-degree assault and attempted second-degree assault charges against Wilson were dropped in exchange for the contraband guilty plea.

"Why are the taxpayers paying the judiciary to hold this hearing on some contraband sandwiches?" he said in a telephone interview with the Gazette of Colorado Springs. "Taxpayers want to know where their money is going - there it is."

Wilson was convicted last month of first-degree murder in the strangling death of Liza Chavez, 37.

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EAGLE LAKE, Fla. - Say it, don't spray it.

That's the message from Vice Mayor Dennis Pate, who accused former city manager Linda Weldon of spewing saliva at him after a city council meeting last month. He wants a new rule to prohibit spitting at meetings.

But Weldon denies that saliva ever passed her lips.

"That is the most asinine and juvenile thing I have heard," she said. "I wouldn't get that close to him. It is just childish stuff, and I don't want to be a part of it any more."

The alleged spitting was preceded by an argument between Pate and Weldon over two minor issues at a city council meeting.

"She came at me and said, 'Oh, phew on you, Dennis Pate,'" he said. "It looked like she was trying to spit - she spit at me. I don't believe city government includes spitting at someone."

No police report was filed in this small citrus belt town, about 45 miles east of Tampa.

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MINNEAPOLIS - The brotherhood of cops in Minneapolis is about to get even closer thanks to one officer's decision to offer a kidney to an ailing colleague.

Officer Ron Reier, Police Department spokesman, was scheduled to donate a kidney this week to fellow officer and friend Jeff Seidl.

Seidl has to undergo kidney dialysis three times a week. He needs another kidney transplant because the kidney he received from a relative began to fail about a year ago.

Reier recalled an e-mail he received about Seidl's failing kidney. He said it was like a radio call from an officer in trouble.

"Every cop on the street would head to that help call," he said.

Reier said testing showed they're "enough of a match to make it work."

The transplant was scheduled Friday at Fairview University Medical Center. Both officers plan to return to work in a few weeks.