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Sales increase as Lottery adds new gamesNews Story
While the number of games has expanded and receipts have greatly increased, the basic structure of the New York Lottery and its mission have remained relatively unchanged over the four decades it has been running, lawmakers and state officials say. The games, then and now, siphon money away from illegal gambling and help to pay for schools. The lottery was approved by voters, at the urging of then-Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, in a referendum to amend the state constitution in 1966. The nu
Jan 30, 2007, 8:51 pm - Lottery News

Video gambling a cash cow even for smaller statesNews Story
Surveying West Virginia's rural neighborhoods, where most people lack broadband access to the Internet, you would never guess the state is a lottery cash cow. That is until you drove by the racetracks that dot major population centers. There you would see crowds of people shoving streams of dollars into buzzing and blinking video lottery terminals the reason this small state, with one of the country's lowest per-capita incomes is home to one of the most lucrative lotteries in the natio
Jan 30, 2007, 8:09 pm - Lottery News

N.Y. Gov. vows to review Lottery operationsNews Story
New York Governor Eliot Spitzer is pledging to review the New York Lottery's operations amid bipartisan calls for reform prompted by a media report revealing that billions of dollars in bets were kept off the Lottery's books. Several state legislators said yesterday that the Lottery Division needed to fully account for all the cash generated by its video lottery terminals, after it was reported that only a portion of wagers was included in the Lottery's financial reports. This is a little
Jan 30, 2007, 7:36 pm - Lottery News

New York Lottery accounting method questionedNews Story
Billions of dollars in bets are kept off the New York Lottery's books. That's because the state Lottery Division does not publicly report the wagers on its video games that go to gamblers as prizes. The figures aren't included in the Lottery's annual reports or audited financial statements, and the Lottery initially declined requests for the amounts wagered on the video machines, and the prizes paid, since the machines were introduced in 2004. Late yesterday, however, a Lottery official
Jan 30, 2007, 6:48 pm - Lottery News

Lottery players learn tough lessonsNews Story
When Chris Ramesar plays the Florida lottery, sometimes he gets a warning from his 8-year-old daughter, Gabriela. Daddy, she says, remember what happened in New York? Ramesar is a 57-year-old co-owner of an auto body shop in Miami. He is thousands of miles and more than a decade removed from the day he found out his lucky numbers had come up in the New York Lottery. But he hasn't forgotten what happened, or the lesson he eventually learned that it is very hard to sue the Lottery s
Jan 30, 2007, 11:47 am - Lottery News

New York Lottery making some changesNews Story
NY Lottery figures better late than never to catch 'raffle fever' It looks like the New York Lottery's new year's resolution is to become more interesting. To accomplish that they are adding one new game and two changes. The first is a new limited scratchoff game called Raffle to Riches. Under this new format the lottery will print only 1.5 million Raffle to Riches tickets. It ends on Feb. 8, or when they're sold out. Out of those 1.5 million $20 tickets, there will be 12 winne
Jan 4, 2007, 7:24 pm - Lottery News

N.Y. Gov. Pataki refuses to extradite gambling CEO, sends him homeNews Story
A judge cleared a former executive of a British gambling company to return to London on Friday after New York's governor declined to sign a warrant extraditing him to Louisiana, where he is charged with illegal online gambling. Peter Dicks, the former chairman of Sportingbet PLC, was arrested at Kennedy International Airport on Sept. 6 after customs officials discovered that he was wanted by Louisiana state police. Offshore Internet gambling, however, is not a crime in New York, and Republ
Sep 29, 2006, 1:43 pm - Lottery News

Lottery addict screams at judge, 'prison won't help'News Story
A sobbing lottery addict convicted of stealing $2.3 million from her employer to fund her habit screamed at the judge that prison won't cure her. Tell me how you're helping me! Annie Donnelly of Farmingville yelled at state Supreme Court Justice Robert Doyle during her sentencing Tuesday. Donnelly pleaded guilty last month to second-degree grand larceny in exchange for the sentence of four to 12 years in prison. The former bookkeeper for a doctors' office admitted she stole the mon
Sep 27, 2006, 2:15 pm - Lottery News

N.Y. Comptroller writes scathing letter to lottery boardNews Story
New York's top fiscal officer is warning a state agency that its delay in approving a VLT casino contract for Aqueduct racetrack is costing the state needed revenues and risking bankruptcy for the New York Racing Association. State Comptroller Alan Hevesi, in a scathing letter to the state Division of Lottery, strongly suggested that with a battle underway to craft a new Thoroughbred racetrack franchise in New York more is driving the VLT delay than normal bureaucratic reviews. It is
Sep 18, 2006, 10:45 pm - Lottery News

Second $1M lottery win for deli worker defies all oddsNews Story
What we're going to talk about today was a one-in-a-million shot. OK, technically the chances were 1 in 3,669,120,000,000 that the New York deli worker who won $1 million from a state lottery game four years ago would win another $1 million in the lottery a month ago. The number of zeros stuck at the end of that figure makes her repeat victory just slightly more difficult than a singer winning Simon's approval on American Idol. The first time I couldn't believe it, Valerie Wilson repor
Sep 12, 2006, 7:51 am - Lottery News