Patty Bigbee: Missouri Lottery Winner Accused of Trying to Sell Grandson for Cash

In 2008 Patty Bigbee purchased a million-dollar lottery ticket at a north St. Louis County quick shop. Two years later, authorities say the 45-year-old grandmother had blown through her winnings and was desperate for cash. So desperate, in fact, that last week in Florida she allegedly tried to sell her grandson for $30,000 -- after first asking $75,000 for the eleven-week-old boy.

Bigbee has a long criminal history. She was convicted of passing bad checks in Ohio in the 1990s. In 2007 she was released from prison in Michigan after serving an eight-year sentence for armed robbery. She lived in St. Louis for only a brief time before taking her lottery winning and moving to Florida.

That's where she became reconnected to her 22-year-old daughter, Stephanie Bigbee-Fleming who'd just given birth to the baby and was also in need of money.

According to reports, grandma and mother hatched a plan to sell the baby. The buyer? Another of Bigbee's daughters, 26-year-old Danielle Skiver, whom she'd recently reconnected with on Facebook.

Bigbee allegedly told Skiver that she and the mother couldn't afford to care for the baby. Would Skiver want to adopt the child -- for a fee? Once money became involved Skiver said she had to alert authorities. She says that she, too, had been sold by Bigbee while she was still a baby and that Bigbee often blackmailed her adoptive parents for additional money by threatening to ask for the child back.

Authorities further allege that Bigbee was also trying to rip-off her daughter Bigbee-Fleming, who thought that her baby was being sold for $10,000 -- $9,000 of which she'd get for the purchase of a car. Instead, Bigbee allegedly planned to sell the baby for much more and keep the lion's share of the proceeds. Bigbee and her boyfriend were arrested in a Best Buy parking lot last week in Daytona Beach where they met Skiver to accept a check for the baby.