WASHINGTON -- A U.S. Senate committee that exercises legislative oversight of issues related to gaming is demanding to know how state lotteries are increasing their security measures after an insider allegedly rigged jackpots for years to enrich himself and associates, reported the Associated Press.
U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, in a letter to Multi-State Lottery Association (MUSL) president Gary Grief and deputy executive director and chief financial officer J. Bret Toyne, requested information about the association’s response to a lottery jackpot rigging scandal.
Investigators said the association's former security director, Eddie Tipton, installed software code that allowed him to predict winning numbers on specific days of the year, said the report. They said he then worked with associates to purchase winning tickets with those numbers and collect the prizes. A jury convicted Tipton in July 2015 of rigging a $16.5 million Hot Lotto jackpot after he was caught on a security camera purchasing the winning ticket at a Des Moines, Iowa, gas station.
Tipton's efforts to collect that jackpot failed, but investigators said Tipton and his associates were successful in collecting three others that paid about $2 million in cash in Colorado, Wisconsin and Oklahoma. Tipton also allegedly bought two winning scratch-off tickets worth $44,000 in Kansas. He is awaiting trial on charges linking him to those prizes.
Tipton's brother, a former Texas justice of the peace, and a friend, businessman Robert Rhodes, are also awaiting trial, the report said.
Following Tipton’s conviction on two counts of fraud in October, MUSL placed its executive director, Charles Strutt, on indefinite administrative leave.
“Other than seeking new leadership, it is unclear what additional measures MUSL is implementing to provide effective oversight to ensure the integrity of lottery games,” Thune wrote. “Indeed, some have suggested that the excitement about increasingly large jackpots has eclipsed reports of insider fraud and what MUSL is doing to address the issue.”
Thune’s letter requests that MUSL respond no later than July 7, 2016, and that its response include the results of any internal investigation of fraud conducted by MUSL
Click here for a copy of Thune’s letter to MUSL.
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