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California man learns $10 million reason not to tell your roommate if you win the lotteryNews Story
This past Christmas, a man in Vacaville, Calif., learned a grim, but useful, holiday lesson: Sometimes, don't spread glad tidings. Keep the good news to yourself. It was Dec. 20, and the city of about 100,000, located midway between Sacramento and San Francisco, was festooned with white lights and toy reindeer. Hoping to get his hands on a bit of extra cash for the holidays, the Vacaville man went to a Lucky grocery store and paid $30 for a scratch-off lottery ticket that odds said would leav
Jan 9, 2019, 5:55 pm - Lottery News

'It was a horrible, horrible crime that I committed,' Jamaican lottery scammer repentsNews Story
Charles Bennett had already lost his home and moved into a trailer to pay the scammers who had taken over his life. Soon he was hiding there in the dark, told in a late-night phone call that he was about to be arrested over unpaid bills. The 85-year-old Massachusetts man would be stopped from selling the trailer by a social services investigation, but he lost all control over his finances. Even then, he starved himself so he could hand over his food allowance to the scammers. He remained conv
Oct 5, 2018, 9:25 am - Lottery News

Last defendant in large Jamaican lottery scam convictedNews Story
A federal jury in North Dakota on Friday convicted a Rhode Island woman of helping scam elderly Americans out of millions of dollars, capping a large-scale Jamaican lottery scam case that authorities have been investigating and prosecuting for six years. Jurors found Melinda Bulgin, 28, guilty of 15 counts of conspiracy, fraud and money laundering, after 3 1/2 hours of deliberations over two days. Defense attorney Kevin Chapman said he likely will appeal. The Providence woman was the last
Sep 15, 2018, 8:36 pm - Lottery News

Police break up scratch-off lottery ticket burglary ringNews Story
Authorities have arrested three San Jose, California, men and are seeking at least one other suspected of breaking into Bay Area businesses to steal lottery scratch-off tickets. Belmont police Capt. Patrick Halleran said his agency cracked the crime ring with help from the Burlingame, Menlo Park, Los Gatos-Monte Sereno, and San Jose police departments and the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office. The suspects would break into closed businesses in the early morning hours and steal large quan
Aug 17, 2018, 1:07 pm - Lottery News

Man busts through store roof, steals lottery ticketsNews Story
Includes video report By Todd Northrop A thief hoping to steal his way to some good luck busted through the roof of a grocery store and took hundreds of dollars worth of lottery tickets on Wednesday. Ironically, unlucky for him, it was all caught on camera. Surveillance footage captured a fairly clear image of the suspect's face, and after about a day on the run, Kevin Croft, 30, was arrested for the crime by Florida detectives. Croft was booked into the Lee County Jail and faces
Jul 20, 2018, 9:01 am - Lottery News

Oregon man arrested for threatening lotteryNews Story
By Todd Northrop A Lebanon, Oregon, man was arrested after he sent a shooting threat in an e-mail to the Oregon Lottery. The Oregon State Police said Jason David Ouellette, 42, was arrested on suspicion of menacing Tuesday afternoon. 5 hours earlier Ouellette had sent an email to the Lottery's Salem headquarters with an imminent threat to shoot and kill people, the law enforcement agency said. Ouellette was jailed in Marion County without incident, troopers said, but was later released
Jul 13, 2018, 11:51 am - Lottery News

NY credit union chief accused of embezzling money from fund, spending $3.55M on lottery ticketsNews Story
The head of the city's oldest credit union embezzled money from the fund for years splurging on millions worth of lottery tickets by submitting bogus invoices for dental work and other expenses, federal prosecutors said Tuesday. Kam Wong, 62, from Valley Stream, L.I., who heads the Municipal Credit Union, allegedly used the ill-gotten gains to purchase some $3.55 million in New York State lottery tickets, according to Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman. He also obtained numerous other
May 8, 2018, 9:06 pm - Lottery News

N.J. man charged in $10K lottery scam on 84-year-old womanNews Story
A New Jersey man tricked an 84-year-old woman into handing over more than $10,000 after telling her she won a lottery, but needed to pay the taxes on the winnings in advance, authorities said. Earl Alton Smith, 40, convinced the Canandaigua, New York, resident to give him a $5,000 check and one totaling $5,500 in October, New York State Police said in a statement. Smith was arrested by Port Authority police on Wednesday at Newark Liberty International Airport as he was about to board a pl
May 1, 2018, 9:23 am - Lottery News

Lottery scammer rigged more drawings than first thought, records showNews Story
The computer program that a former lottery security official used to rig drawings worth millions of dollars in Iowa and other states was more expansive than investigators first discovered, court records filed last week show. Eddie Tipton, a former employee of the Multi-State Lottery Association (MUSL) in Clive, wrote the code to allow him to predict the randomly drawn numbers of multimillion-dollar jackpots in as many as 17 states and claim the cash prizes. The code remained active and und
Feb 19, 2018, 6:03 pm - Lottery News

New Jersey store clerk accused of stealing $1M lottery ticketNews Story
A New Jersey convenience store worker stole a customer's $1 million-winning lottery ticket and tried to pass it off as his own, authorities say. Rayhan Sorwar, 36, who worked at an Edison convenience store, has been charged with theft of moveable property over $75,000, a second-degree crime; conspiracy to commit money laundering; and attempted money laundering, both first-degree crimes, according to Middlesex County Prosecutor Andrew C. Carey. He was charged during a joint investigation by
Jan 26, 2018, 6:43 pm - Lottery News