HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. — A Long Island deli owner and his son were charged Saturday with scamming a customer out of a $1 million lottery ticket.
Nassau County police say a 34-year-old man who doesn't speak English bought the ticket Thursday at the Peninsula Deli & Grocery in Hempstead.
The man scratched off his card, saw that he was a winner and handed it to 26-year-old Karim Jaghab to get his winnings, police said.
The ticket was worth $1 million, but Jaghab gave the man $1,000 in cash and kept the ticket, police said.
The customer became suspicious and went back Friday, police said. They say Jaghab and his 57-year-old father, Nabil Jaghab, the owner of the deli, tried to give him $10,000 and told him not to go to the police, authorities said.
The customer went to police, who determined that he had won the $1 million jackpot.
The Jaghabs, of East Meadow, were arraigned Saturday on grand larceny charges. Each was ordered held on $7,500 bond. According to Newsday, their attorney said it was a simple mistake on a payout on a lottery machine.
A similar case unfolded in Suffolk County this year when two Riverhead gas station clerks and the brother of one of the clerks were charged with scamming a customer out of a $74,892 prize.
In that case, police said the clerks gave the man $774 in cash. As with the Nassau case, the victim was an immigrant who speaks no English.
In another case in Syracuse, two brothers who claimed a $5 million lottery ticket sold at their family's store were charged with scamming the winning ticket from a customer in 2006. One brother was sentenced this year to up to 25 years in prison for possessing the stolen ticket; both brothers were acquitted of conspiracy charges.
Oh no!!! Not again!!!
It's getting to the point where is very difficult to feel sorry for people who buy lottery tickets and have no idea of the value. Makes me wonder how many players are cheated out of the full amount of winners under $100 and I'll bet these stores are making a killing on EBT cards.
The scanners dont work on scratch offs. Mostly.
If you don't know how to tell how much you've won - don't play.
In most cases you cant tell until you play.
A simple mistake, but don't go to the Police. Jerks.
Of course - but after you play you don't need a clerk to tell you how much you've won. Learn.
A store in my area lost their lottery for good for doing the same thing. One of the clerks is in jail.
I hope they are prosecuted to the fullest!
Whatever happened to honesty, trust, dignity, and self respect?. Just because an individual{your customer for that matter}, cannot speak the language, or lacks the wherewithal to enable them to decipher the value of that particular instrument, is no reason for you to take advantage of the situation. What are you gonna do when you think that nobody is watching?. ONCE A THIEF, ALWAYS A THIEF. I hope they lock'em up and throw away the key. Dumba$$e$!!!.
a sure cure for such people and to prevent any more problems , is to bbq the crooks in full site of the public
Sad to say there are no laws in place to make someone think twice about committing a crime anymore.
Hearsetrax I agree.
It's getting ridiculous. First of all these players who are becoming victims should learn the game and how to tell a winning ticket from a losing ticket. Also if you're going to hand over a winning ticket to another person it makes sense to write your name and sign at the back of it in ink.
If I would to win a large prize which that'll probably never happen. I'll make coppies of the ticket to avoid from something like that happening.
There are many ways to check and verify your tickets long before going to the store. Newspaper, online,poster boards in stores where they write the results.
I actually never sign my winning scratch off tickets. I just use my smart phone and take a picture of it with the winning numbers scratched off and the amounts revealed. For draw type games, I always sign the back of the winning tickets before handing them over.
Your a smart man Maringoman. There are numerous ways to defend yourself from these "schmucks"
Amen. Well said sir.. I detest mutts like those 2 people.
And it isn't the first time this stuff has happend. Now they will pay. 
These merchants of deception, need to have their licenses, to sell lottery tickets revoked. Selling lottery tickets, is a privilege not a right. What a bunch of ignoramuses.
Many merchants are decent hardworking people. BUT many are crooks and thieves just like so many other entities in the public sector...The ticket scanners can be manipulated also .. Many shops have scanners that work one day and are broken (disconnected) the next... Sadly, You must be on your guard at all times...
And if there from another country doing this sort of stuff, "DEPORT" them..
Deporting them does not solve the problem. Deport them today, and in one week they are back in the States again, grinning and sinning as usual, like it is Xmas time
.
Just running them through the mill is better than nothing.
Agreed. Times are tough but let's not gwt comfortable blaming the victim. I can bet it was too tempting to resist because of whatever financial problems the store owners had, but the main driver was probably they thought their was a good likelihood that they will succeed, based on the vunerable characteristics of their victim. That is the same modus operandi of the street thug.
Way to keep it classy new york
Added to that is the fact that people are being taken advantage of because they speak " very little English" .
Rule of thumb: Learn the language of the country you living in or be prepared to experience this crap time and again.
There is probably more of this going on that meets the eye. Some folk who are winners are too scared to call in the Police for fear of being asked " Are you a legal immigrant?" which is beside the point, but could be asked nonetheless.
NEVER HAPPEN.. With the current administration who hasn't once been held accountable for all THEIR failures from Fast & furious to Bengazi, to O' Ahole-care it will never take place.. The only way is to rid the Capitol of these pos's and take back the White house ...Problem is the replacements aren't much better.....
I could not agree more. I'm surprised at how many people are actually blaming the victim here for being scammed. Stands to reason that if he was an illegal citizen, he wouldn't have gone to the police and reported it.
It tells you something about these people when they tried to scam him not once, but twice. And it takes serious balls to then blame the 'mistake' on the machine, as if anyone is really going to believe they didn't know exactly what they were doing and how much the ticket was worth. If we even pretended that was true, they knew he won enough that he was supposed to have gone to the lottery office to get the money, they weren't supposed to have given him the cash for that amount. There's no way they are going to be able to explain that away.
How about we actually put the blame on the CROOKS (who are still lying and still trying to finagle their way out of the crime THEY commited) instead of the guy whose only fault seemed to have been initially assuming that they were honest people. There have been American, English-only speaking players who have been scammed like this too. Just because they weren't born the sharpest tool in the shed doesn't mean they deserve to get robbed.
" Take back the White House?".. take it back to where?
Last time we had Republicans in the White House- we had BILLIONS of Dollars being shipped by C140's into a crapHole called Iraq. The Old Guard got this country fighting TWO wars simultaneously... so take us back to what exactly?
You are correct though- both parties are weak and untrustworthy.
so true
When my sister first moved to NY (LI) she bought a lottery ticket -I believe she had 4 or 5 numbers-she went to cash it in and was told she had won $340
The next day she went to work and was telling co-workers of her "good fortune" -when one of them asked her " How much did you get????"
when my sister told her-she said to my sister-- they cheated you!!! turned out the co-worker's brother had the same amount of numbers--only he had to go to the lottery's office to collect because the payoff was over a thousand dollars- during their lunch break my sister and two of her co-workers went down to confront the
store employees-strange when they got there all the employees who were there the day before was at the store--except the one who cashed her ticket!!!
three weeks later there was an investigation -the store no longer is allowed to sell NY State lotteries of any kind- even to this day--
these people never learn
however I will say this NY lotteries really need to change the codes on their scratch off tickets--
here in Va you know if you won because the initals of the amount you win is the code
New York is the state that flat out rejected the investigations that was done in California and other states that led to a lot of arrests. Maybe they will allow it now.
According to Newsday, their attorney said it was a simple mistake on a payout on a lottery machine.
Don't think Lawyer Saul will help them. What's he gonna say. One million did'nt fit across the machine display. Their not suppose to give 1k.
There seems to be way too many " simple mistakes" being made when it comes to lottery wins. What else would you expect their attorney to say- it was a " big mistake" for his clients to make? We know that, thing is to admit that is to admit guilt.
The only answer is Jail-Time.
"The man scratched off his card, saw that he was a winner and handed it to 26-year-old Karim Jaghab to get his winnings, police said."
So the winner expected a million dollars in cash from Karim Jaghab right then?
Note to the winner: if you win big, stay calm and exit the store as if nothing happened (and take the ticket with you)
I'm also troubled at those quick to jump on the winner, and yes they were obviously "legal" or they would not have gone to the authorities.
It's easy to ridicule those who don't speak our language well yet or understand much who are relatively new to the country, just remember folks that EVERYONE replying here on this board unless your Native American or Inuit, your family were immigrants too. People who come to this country legally have to jump through more hoops and work harder than just about anyone I've ever met. I've worked helping them transition for years. So please don't let your vitriol towards illegals spill over onto those just following our American dream.
Also sadly it is becoming more and more frequent that those who are considered vulnerable to be preyed upon by people with that "thug" mentality, it's a errosion of pesonal accountablity and moral compass.