Bum wins money, blows it all and dies in a pile of malt liquor bottles

This story is amazing and really doesn't even need any commentary from me, because it writes itself.

From skid row to riches to an early grave
Steven Schulman, a homeless man who won a large judgment after being run over by a semi, is found dead at age 55.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-rags-to-riches-20100818,0,6926110.story

His story was originally chronicled in the LA Times at http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jun/14/local/la-me-rags-to-riches-20100615

Basically this bum Schulman was sleeping in the middle of an alley, and a trucker accidentally ran over the guy's legs, because he didn't think anyone would be stupid enough to sleep in the middle of a fucking alley. An ambulance-chasing vampiric lawyer saw an opportunity to turn Schulman's bloody legs into money and sued the trucking company of the driver. Schulman won almost $700,000!

Story highlights:

In the months that followed, Schulman wasted no time spending his fortune. He took frequent trips to fine sushi restaurants, hollering for sake refills and filets. He adorned his new apartment with flat screen TVs and sports memorabilia.

When a lightly used black Corvette he purchased went missing, he didn't wait longer than a couple of days to replace it with a brand new red Corvette. The misplaced Corvette was later recovered — and he kept both. He burned through more than $200,000 of his lawsuit money (from a total of $350,000 after lawyer fees, loans and other costs) in less than a year.

Former bum Steven Schulman in one of his *TWO* Corvettes that he shouldn't have bought. Pic from LATimes.com

...Doctors warned him to stop drinking, but on a recent afternoon his home was littered with empty cans of mixed drinks.
He was found dead beside several empty bottles of King Cobra malt liquor Tuesday morning, said his attorney, Gary Casselman. Neighbors grew concerned when they heard his dog, Pebbles, whimpering behind the door. Their attention had already been piqued, Casselman said, because they hadn't seen Schulman walking the massive German shepherd mix outside the apartment complex.

...Since Schulman's legal victory, Casselman said, the dog had grown fat from a steady diet of cheeseburgers.

Wow, that is all spectacular and sensational. This story really illustrates how giving homeless people money is not much better than throwing the money away. Separately it shows how some people will always be broke no matter how much money they make. Schulman suffered from sheer and utter stupidity when it came to money. He was an alcoholic, but there are alcoholics that earn wages and don't go broke. However, if this guy had freed himself of his addiction to alcohol, he still would have blown all of his money, as evident by his frivolous purchases. Science has not yet developed a way to inject intelligence into dumb mother fuckers like this bum. What are our options then? Unfortunately smacking the shit out of him won't knock some sense into him. He would have been better off if someone (his lawyer? the government?) confiscated his money and gave it to him in small payments, rather than giving him the lump sum that he blew through. Perhaps there could be government intervention on spending for those who have been on welfare or who have been homeless...If society has had to support someone, that person gives up some rights for a period of time with any money earned and has to show good spending habits to prove that society won't have to support them again.

Steven Schulman would have blown through even a gorillion dollars.