Arkansas woman accused of stealing 64 lottery tickets from store that fired her

A 22-year-old Jonesboro woman is being held on a $50,000 bond after police in Arkansas said she took 64 lottery tickets from the store that had fired her and played them.

Special Judge Barbara Halsey found probable cause on Wednesday to charge Allison Nancy Williams with lottery fraud and with theft of property valued at more than $1,000 and at or below $5,000. Both are Class D felonies. Williams has not entered a plea, has not been convicted, and is presumed innocent until proven guilty.

According to the affidavit, Williams was fired from the gas station chain Maverik at 3920 Southwest Drive and is accused of removing 64 tickets with a face value of $1,280 from the store dispenser. Store management gave a police officer a packet of documentation on September 9, along with photographs.

The affidavit says Williams told an investigator that she took the tickets, played them, and threw the losing ones in the trash, and that she processed winning tickets normally, put the ticket in the drawer, and kept the cash. She told the investigator she won $150. 

A Class D felony in Arkansas carries a sentence of up to six years under state code section 5-4-401. Two counts were filed.

Store-level ticket theft leaves a paper trail

Cases like this one surface quickly because scratch-off inventory is tracked ticket by ticket. Every ticket carries a serial number, packs are activated and settled through a lottery terminal, and any prize paid at the counter is validated against that same record. When a pack goes missing or gets played out of sequence, the reconciliation shows it. The Jonesboro store had documentation and photographs ready for an officer within days.

On the legitimate side of the same rack, $350,000 Payout currently leads all Arkansas games with a ValueScore™ of 91.1 and under 20% of its print run sold. State rankings are on our best value list, and the full Arkansas lineup is on the Arkansas state page.

Sources

KAIT: Fired store employee accused of stealing, playing lottery tickets

Arkansas Code section 5-4-401: Sentence

Arkansas Scholarship Lottery: Scratch-off games and prize data