The Mendykara District Court of Kazakhstan's Kostanay Region has upheld the rights of a resident who won the main prize in a contest. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing Sputnik Kazakhstan.
The woman, who was declared the winner, filed a lawsuit after she did not receive her prize. According to the court's statement, in July of last year the defendant, an LLP, announced a contest on social media with an apartment as the main prize. In October, the plaintiff was publicly declared the winner of the contest.
"Her victory was confirmed by screenshots, and the defendant did not dispute this fact," the court's statement said.
However, the company refused to give the winner the apartment. "Representatives of the LLP stated that the plaintiff's account was fake, and therefore the contest results were annulled, the draw was held again, and according to its results the prize was given to another participant," the court reported.
The plaintiff and her representative disagreed with the defendant's arguments. They pointed out that the account was the woman's personal page and had been created long before the contest was held. The defendant did not provide concrete evidence confirming that the woman's account was fake.
"During the consideration of the case, it was established that IP addresses were not checked, it was not determined that the accounts belonged to one person, and technical means of verifying the social media page were not used. Thus, the defendant's arguments that the plaintiff's account was fake were not sufficiently confirmed by the evidence presented to the court," the Kostanay Regional Court reported.
By the court's decision, 7,682,000 tenge was recovered from the LLP that organized the contest in favor of the winner. The court decision has entered into legal force.