Minneapolis -- She bought a scratch-off Minnesota lottery ticket, scuffed away the coating and found she'd won $20. But when the woman went to cash it in, the lottery computer told her it had already been redeemed.
The woman's discovery in September launched an investigation that led Hennepin County prosecutors to charge three convenience store clerks with state lottery fraud this week.
The three worked at a SuperAmerica in Long Lake, Minn., and they allegedly spent their idle hours behind the cash register "micro-scratching," removing a smidgen of the latex coating covering the ticket's validation number, then entering the information into the Minnesota State Lottery computer to see if it was a winner.
While most micro-scratchers buy winning tickets in an attempt to hide their subterfuge, the three clerks allegedly would cash in winning tickets, then put the tickets back for sale.
"Their mistake is they got greedy," said Doug Wills, the Minnesota State Lottery's chief of security. "Generally, when you scratch a winner, you buy it. Why would you want to resell it?"
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The three charged are Joshua Wayne Evjen, 20, of Orono; Ashley Jo-Cass Giswold, 19, of Minnetonka; and Samantha Sue Gergen, 18, of Mayer. Each was charged with one count of state lottery fraud, a felony.
All have initial court dates scheduled for Feb. 1.
Orono, Minn., police officer Chad Stensrud, who investigated the case, said officials haven't determined how much the three allegedly netted from the scheme, but they believe the clerks were illicitly scratching tickets for six to eight months.
"That was kind of always in question," he said of the amount allegedly taken. "They were always unwilling to say how much they actually did, as most people are. They would admit they were doing it, but they wouldn't say how much."
The case came to light when a woman bought a $10 "Hot Slots" lottery ticket at the SuperAmerica on West Industrial Boulevard in Long Lake. When she scratched off the latex coating, she discovered she'd won $20. (Her chance of doing so was one in 10, according to the Lottery's Web site.)
To redeem a ticket, a sales clerk first scans a bar code on its back, then enters three digits from a 10-digit validation code found on the front. That code is disclosed when the latex covering is scratched off.
When the sales clerk scanned the bar code of the woman's ticket and entered the three-digit code into the computer, she was told the ticket had already been redeemed.
"A ticket can only be validated once," Stensrud said. "They wouldn't give her the money, thinking she had already cashed it in. She got hold of the Lottery, and it started snowballing from there."
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Because the computer keeps a record of when and where all lottery tickets are sold and redeemed, investigators determined that Evjen was the clerk who sold the ticket to the woman, Wills said.
Investigators found five other lottery cards in a bin at the SuperAmerica. The cards had been redeemed when Gergen and Giswold had been working, according to an affidavit filed by Stensrud.
Wills said the Lottery sees a case or two of "micro-scratching" each month.
"It's pretty labor-intensive, and not too many people can do it, but if you've got enough time on the midnight shift, you can," he said.
