Man gets probation for lottery fraud

A Jefferson City man has been placed on five years supervised probation after pleading guilty to a charge of felony stealing in an attempt to fraudulently collect lottery winnings.

Court documents show Nathan Bracy, 30, of 3939 Dewberry Drive, committed the crime in June 2013.

A Jefferson City Police Department probable cause statement shows two employees of the Missouri Lottery entered Citgo, 105 W. Dunklin St., to do a compliance game investigation.

Bracy was working at the store when the lottery employees, posing as customers, presented two tickets.

One ticket was a losing ticket, the other was a winner.

Store equipment notified Bracy that one of the tickets was a winner and to let the customer know so they could collect their winnings.

Instead, Bracy told the customer the ticket was not a winner and threw the ticket in the trash.

The next day, an associate of Bracy arrived at the lottery office and produced the ticket purchased that was a winner, saying he got it from the trash at Citgo.

The amount of the ticket was not disclosed, but in a charging document it was listed to have a value of at least $500.

In July 2013, authorities interviewed Bracy and his accomplice.

The accomplice admitted Bracy had given him the ticket and told him he legitimately won the money, but could not collect the winnings because of financial obligations he had to the state.

Bracy then admitted he knew the ticket was a winner and deceived the customer by throwing it in the trash.

He said he later retrieved the ticket and gave it to his friend to collect the winnings.