The scammer's dream: a true believer

Nov. 29, 2006
By JOSEPH M. DELEON News-Post Staff
jdeleon@fredericknewspost.com

  FREDERICK — Josefa Motyka has spent thousands of dollars over the past few years trying to claim millions from lotteries she never entered. So far, she's collected nothing.
     Prozac and pain patches help her endure unbearable pain. The 68-year-old lives alone in her Clarksburg home where she struggles with bipolar disorder. Degenerative disk disease immobilizes her most days.
     One day last month, she received 55 letters from different lotteries — she won every one.
     “I break my neck to get the $20 to claim it,” she said in a telephone interview last month. “I borrow money or let a bill go so I can try to win that money.”
     She often buys $20 money orders, tears off the perforated receipt and staples it to the notification letter. Then she waits.
     When she has a good feeling about one of the dozens of letters that fill her mailbox every day, she tells her neighbors how she'll help pay their medical and utility bills.
     “You get one and you think you could win and you watch the days go by and you watch for the mailman,” she said. “Now, my kids are mad at me and my friends think I'm an idiot.”
     Ms. Motyka said she has three sons, but declined to name them. She said her youngest son also battles depression and her oldest has liver problems. Her middle son died nine years ago.
     “You keep thinking this is the one — it's like an addition,” she said. “I never smoked a cigarette or taken a drink in my life, but this must be what it's like to be addicted.”
     She's spent so much money trying to claim the money, she sometimes goes without eating. Once last year, her weight dropped to 78 pounds.
     “I'm better now,” she said. “I'm up to about 97 pounds and I'm doing everything I can to stop.”
     Ms. Motyka keeps every piece of mail and studies the names, signatures and business names looking for patterns. After days of examining the letters, she can't resist trying to claim a prize.
     “I can't take one $20 bill and make everything better,” she said. “That's why I'm trying to win.”
     She believes there are some good sweepstakes out there, but the fake ones ruin her chances of winning.
     “You tell your friends you're going to help them, but you feel so embarrassed when they lose faith in you,” she said “You don't know the heartbreak this brings me. All I want to do is help my friends and family.”