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Original buyer of $1M lottery ticket identifiedNews Story
How do you explain to your loved ones that you threw away $1 million?Well, we'll just have to wait to find out, because Kevin Donovan isn't answering questions right now.In fact, Donovan doesn't even want anybody to know who he is. He's been keeping a low profile since immersing himself in a dispute over a winning $1 million lottery ticket with an 82-year-old Blackstone man who found it in a trash bin.Donovan, who is seeking to regain ownership of the ticket, has not been identified in public un
Dec 19, 2005, 8:03 am - Lottery News

Impartial choice promised for Texas Lottery chiefNews Story
The chairman of the Texas Lottery Commission said Wednesday that politics will play no part in whether a powerful ex-lawmaker is hired to run the beleaguered state agency.Former state Rep. Talmadge Heflin, a Houston Republican who lost his bid for a 12th term by a scant 16 votes last year, was an 11th-hour entry into the hunt to replace former director Reagan Greer after Lottery Commission Chairman C. Thomas Clowe encouraged him to apply last month. At least eight other applicants had made it to
Dec 9, 2005, 1:30 pm - Lottery News

Lottery number strategies subject of newspaper investigationNews Story
The odds are long. The drawings are random. And the house keeps a much greater share of wagers than other forms of gambling.In sum: The lottery cannot be beaten. There is no system that can improve your chances of winning the lottery, period, says Mike Orkin, a California mathematician who has written extensively about gambling odds.Yet the quest for an ever-elusive winning lottery strategy is alive and well and for sale.On a quiet, dead-end street in Denville stands the headquarters of Doubl
Dec 6, 2005, 1:26 am - Lottery News

N.J. Lottery scratch games called 'paper slot machines'News Story
Stephen Sunny Big Guy Bernath buys a fistful of instant lottery tickets every day and takes his place on a wooden bench next to a garbage can in front of the Krauszer's R J Food Store in Perth Amboy.There, the heavyset 70-year-old man rubs each ticket with a finger, cusses at it, then tosses it in the trash.Rub, cuss, toss.Rub, cuss, toss.He has been known to do this for hours, filling the garbage can with his losers before going back into the store to try his luck again. Crossword. Betty Boop
Dec 5, 2005, 1:23 am - Lottery News

Newspaper takes a hard look at the N.J. LotteryNews Story
They call her the Queen of the Lottery.Her realm: the North Broad Foodmart, a convenience store behind a gas station off Route 22 in Hillside.One evening, as the queen, aka Pat Howard, an insurance agent who lives in Newark, waits in line for the green machine, someone asks how much she spends. Maybe $20, $30 a day, she says.At this, the crowded store falls silent. Then, all at once, everyone laughs.After the queen is finished with her order, store manager Rashmi Patel spins a swivel scre
Dec 4, 2005, 7:24 am - Lottery News

Million-dollar ticket fight goes before Mass. Lottery boardNews Story
In the opening round of what may be a lengthy legal battle, an 83-year-old local man who found a winning Massachusetts lottery ticket in a trash bin defended his right to the $1 million prize yesterday, fending off a rival claim.The hearing, at the headquarters of the Massachusetts Lottery Commission in Braintree, was largely an exercise in legal technicalities.The commission said earlier this month is had already rejected a counterclaim on a ticket found by Edward St. John in a trash bin at the
Nov 30, 2005, 12:03 pm - Lottery News

Couple learns downside of lottery pools -- the hard wayNews Story
A United Kingdom couple faces the prospect of losing their home after the High Court dismissed their claim for a slice of a 7.2 million (US$12.3 million) UK Lotto jackpot.Tony and Kay Tomkins were handed an 86,000 (US$147,026) legal bill after claiming a fellow syndicate member struck lucky but secretly kept their share of the payout.After a seven-year wrangle, the court accepted evidence that pal Mark East's dad won the cash and gave him a 1 million slice.A judge struck out the Tomkins' cl
Nov 28, 2005, 12:51 pm - Lottery News

Powerball Lottery Winner Found Dead in Her Geodesic DomeNews Story
A woman who won a $65.4 million Powerball jackpot with her husband five years ago was found dead at her home overlooking the Ohio River, where she had apparently been for days before anyone found her, police said.Virginia Metcalf Merida's son discovered her body Wednesday. Police were awaiting autopsy and toxicology results before announcing a cause of death.When the woman and her husband, Mack Wayne Metcalf, won the jackpot, they told lottery officials they were going their separate ways to ful
Nov 28, 2005, 6:23 am - Lottery News

Father, son feud over lottery winningsNews Story
Two months ago, a Vietnamese immigrant named Thien Minh Luu said he experienced a stroke of extraordinary good fortune: He bought a $5 lottery scratch ticket at a convenience store in Worcester and won $1 million.But what first appeared to be the quintessential modern American fairy tale has turned into the archetypal American family feud. The 45-year-old manicurist filed a lawsuit, saying his 21-year-old son tricked him into turning over the ticket and then tried to steal the winnings.Luu and h
Nov 23, 2005, 10:42 am - Lottery News

Texas lawmakers hear allegations about lottery disaster siteNews Story
The Texas Lottery Commission would not be able to resume critical functions in a timely manner if its headquarters were destroyed because its disaster recovery site lacks important equipment, a former lottery employee told lawmakers Monday.Shelton Charles, a senior lottery systems analyst who was fired Nov. 4, told the House Licensing and Administrative Procedures Committee that he warned his bosses that backing up data was useless if the agency didn't have the equipment to access it. He said hi
Nov 15, 2005, 5:00 pm - Lottery News