Arizona lottery retailer employee sued after buying $12.8 million ticket knowing it was a winner

Comment #37

gvpazkn — Thu, 12 Mar 2026 13:13:43 GMT

Possession is 9/10ths of the law...

Comment #36

mypiemaster — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 03:35:18 GMT

The employee committed fraud/theft against the store and should be fired immediately.

Comment #35

lakerben — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 03:31:17 GMT

Bummer .

Comment #34

grwurston — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 03:25:24 GMT

Every lottery ticket has the phrase, This ticket is a bearer instrument written on the back of it. It should belong to the manager. He signed it.

Now the questions are, Exactly who at corporate arranged to have the ticket taken away from Gawlitza and given to the lottery office, how and why did they arrange it, and how did they convince Gawlitza to give up the ticket if the ticket was in his possession? Were there any threats made? Why would corporate willingly turn the ticket over to the A... [ More ]

Comment #33

Artist77 — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 11:08:27 GMT

Courts do not fo that and would simply suspend and freeze payment until the final adjudication.

Comment #32

DELotteryPlyr — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 02:21:47 GMT

This is gonna be alot of fun to follow the case, hope the court doesn't just let the ticket expire and give no ruling.

Comment #31

Artist77 — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 19:43:05 GMT

Well those things rarely happen in precedent setting cases without counsel having participated in fraud, missing court ordered deadlines over and over and general outrageous conduct. I have seen it happen in two divorce cases where a friend and an acquaintance married bums and regretted it a few years later. Both husbands kept changing their Counsel every few months because they did not pay their prior attorneys and engaged in lying to the court about not being able to attend court hearings sinc... [ More ]

Comment #30

Think — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 19:00:52 GMT

Also I had a lawyer once tell me that he represented a client who was being sued and there was no way he should have won the case but the other guys attorney was so incompetent that he did win. He always wondered if the other guy ever figured out what a bad attorney he hired

Comment #29

Artist77 — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 18:10:57 GMT

Anyone can sue for anything. But not all attorneys give poor advice. If a client considers themselves an expert on every topic and insists on moving forward, there will be an attorney to take the case. As with anything, buyer beware just like there are subpar contractors, builders, financial experts, etc.

I focus on the likelihood of overcoming a motion to dismiss.

Comment #28

LottoFanBoy — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 13:17:17 GMT

It seems most people here misunderstood the news. Circle K store manager Robert Gawlitza committed fraud. He knew beforehand the ticked he purchased had won the jackpot. That's the reason why he bought it. He is entitled to nothing. The owner of the ticket is whoever usually takes the loss for the rejects.

Comment #27

DELotteryPlyr — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 12:04:16 GMT

There are ALOT of attorneys that make a great living on 'no legal claim' cases. They get paid for trying and that is often all they care about.

Comment #26

KY Floyd — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 07:56:03 GMT

it was the first time a big winner was amongst the rejected pile.

I think I remember a similar story in the past, but it's not a good enough memory to be very confident. Memory aside, probability suggest that it would he been for a smaller amount prize.

I'm obviously not a lawyer but it's pretty obvious that the ticket belongs to the store.

It was unsold at the time of the draw therefore the store had to buy it.

I agree, but primarily for a different reason.According to the firs... [ More ]

Comment #25

Brock Lee — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 17:33:17 GMT

$85 worth of tickets is a lot. it's weird for someone to try to buy that much, then look in their wallet and see they only have $60, then spend every last dollar on tickets. i wonder if it was someone buying for their lottery pool and miscalculated how much they had collected from the other members. if not, sounds like a gambling problem.

Comment #24

Artist77 — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 11:24:44 GMT

The customer paid for $60 of tickets and not $85. No legal claim.

Comment #23

DELotteryPlyr — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 11:17:23 GMT

Good point. It appears this employee has done this before, maybe its a daily routine to go through this tickets each day.

So if the store failed to follow corp policy and left the tickets accessible to the employee, hummmm.

Also bet we see the customer who didnt pay for them try to get into this, file a suite of their own

Comment #22

Artist77 — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 11:13:25 GMT

Thanks. That is very interesting.

Comment #21

DrMiracle — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 03:15:08 GMT

Most stores close their cash registers at midnight, and any unpaid tickets are written off with that day s sales. Those stacked tickets are stapled to the cash register printout and placed in a box. So how can those same tickets be sold again the next day?

It sounds like Circle K has no system in place, and the employees know it.

Comment #20

JustMaybe — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 02:58:12 GMT

Not sure how it will all end up, but, one thing am 100% certain - the player that left the extra tickets if they are positive that was them, they are having a massive heart ache.

But like they say, maybe fate was saving them from harm and statements like I wish I never won the money

Who knows.

Comment #19

Brock Lee — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 02:46:58 GMT

circle k corporate is just trying to get ahead of reputation damage since, from a customer's point of view, this looks sketchy as f. the average customer is not going to dive deeper into corporate policy and lottery regulations, they're just going to avoid circle k if they think the company lets sketchy activity slide.

Comment #18

Artist77 — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 23:27:05 GMT

After reading a couple of other news articles, am I understanding this correctly? The Circle K corporate office vs a single owned Circle K store filed the lawsuit. And the individual store manager who claimed the ticket is not the owner or lessee of the individual store? Who owns or leases this individual store? And the lottery system computer inventory is separate from the store sales inventory

Comment #17

Coin Toss — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 22:14:23 GMT

This is an extreme case of past posting (claiming winnings on a bet after the results are in).

Comment #16

pstfleur — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 20:43:05 GMT

In my opinion, I would have to say that the ticket belongs to the store. He purchased the unsold ticket after the draw, however, the cost of the ticket was already absorbed by the store and was useless once the draw had occurred.

It would be nice if the store and the employee split the winnings, but the store most likely wins this.

Comment #15

Think — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 20:17:45 GMT

I'm obviously not a lawyer but it's pretty obvious that the ticket belongs to the store.

It was unsold at the time of the draw therefore the store had to buy it.

This isn't much different than the scratcher scams where the employee tells the customer that they didn't win and the employee pockets the ticket after it won and cashes it for themselves.

Comment #14

Coin Toss — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 18:42:24 GMT

Tony Numbers, In Nevada having someone else cash the ticket or even making bets is called 'sending in a beard'. There are some very good sports bettors and if they personally showed up to make their bets there would be players after them saying I want $100 worth of what he or she bet .

Comment #13

sully16 — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 18:25:41 GMT

I like how he changed clothes to appear off the street, creative.

Comment #12

Artist77 — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 18:22:21 GMT

There has to be a legal basis and this case is novel and will set precedent. The other employees have no arguable legal claim.

These proposals of tossing $ to everyone even remotely connected always concern me. It reminds me of some members proposing that the DC guy who claimed he won PB by playing wrongly posted numbers and members thought he should be given some $ for his trouble.

Comment #11

CDanaT — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 18:15:55 GMT

Was the ticket created before the draw ? Appears to be

Was the ticket legally sold to a person who can legally purchase it ?? Appears to be

Can the legally printed/not-yet-sold ticket be purchased after the draw ??

Does the Manager have any history of buying returned tickets, after any previous draws ?

This will be interesting if/when it gets to a court and not in the Lottery Commissions hands.

Comment #10

JackpotWanna — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 18:15:02 GMT

I think the owner and employee should share 50% 50%.

Comment #9

heisenberg991 — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 18:12:14 GMT

Can you buy the tickets after the drawing has occurred? I don't think he wins the jackpot if he did this.

Comment #8

Tony Numbers — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 17:43:32 GMT

85.00$ of tickets were printed of which a customer only paid for 60.00$ and left the remaining 25.00$ worth of tickets. Those remaining tickets sat in the store after the drawing was conducted. An employee learned that the jackpot winning ticket was sold at the store he works in. He decides to check the pile of rejected tickets and finds the winning ticket. Surely this isn't the first time there was a pile of rejected tickets that were printed and couldn't be cancelled and the store had to eat t... [ More ]

Comment #7

Artist77 — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 17:11:35 GMT

Some great case law will be made one way or another in this matter. I assume these stores are like a franchise but if the contract is silent on the issue, it may be split between Citcle K and the store manager (owner?). The Circle k website says it uses a hybrid model for the stores so this may control the outcome along with what has been the standard practice for leftover tickets.

Update: It looks like individual stores are required to pay for unsold tickets so the individual store owner mi... [ More ]

Comment #6

noise-gate — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 16:31:33 GMT

* l am on a different flight here. At the TIME of the drawing who owned the unclaimed tickets? Was it the store or was it up for grabs? Is it legal for one to enrich themselves through deception

Comment #5

Powerball765 — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 16:15:34 GMT

This is my Recommendation a friendly settlement everyone happy. The original owner that didn't pay $1,000,000 . The employee $1,000,000. All the other employees at that store $50,000 each. The rest build a new Circle k with Super lotto lounge for Players the best part free soda if you buy something at the store lol Like China says Win Win for everyone

Comment #4

Cruzincat — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 16:00:26 GMT

Some time ago, I requested A multi state lottery ticket over ten draws. This was before you could use a form to fill out what you wanted. The clerk made a mistake and printed ten tickets for one drawing with the same numbers. Then she had the gall to ask if I wanted them. I'll bet they sold them to customers that came later. The numbers never hit, so no one was affected.

Comment #3

Tucker Black — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 15:50:08 GMT

Returned tickets have odds that are just as crummy as any other lottery tickets, so I wouldn't buy them just because they were returned (printed by mistake or the would-be player didn't have enough money).

What retailers should do, like any retailer with excess merchandise, is offer them at 50% off. I'll buy them.

Comment #2

CDanaT — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 14:43:35 GMT

Filings say Gawlitza clocked out, removed his company uniform, and bought some of the tickets from another employee for $10, after which he signed the back of the ticket worth $12.8 million.

Very Smart on his part. Most likely a policy that you can not purchase lottery tickets while on duty. I am rooting for Robert on this one hope he prevails.

If a retailer accepts a returned draw game ticket from a player or generates a draw game ticket refused by the player and the retailer does not

Comment #1

winterhug — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 13:08:20 GMT

I think the winning ticket should go to the manager of the Circle K since he purchased it. It was smart of him to realize that the winning ticket may be in the stack of unpaid for tickets and purchase the ticket for himself.

Arizona lottery retailer employee sued after buying $12.8 million ticket knowing it was a winner

Lottery Post — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 12:49:18 GMT

Contention over who should be entitled to the jackpot prize

By Kate Northrop

An employee at an Arizona Lottery retailer is being taken to court after purchasing a lottery ticket he already knew won a $12.8 million jackpot in The Pick.

There's a legal battle heating up in Arizona over a $12.8 million The Pick jackpot and about who the winning lottery ticket rightfully belongs to.

A complaint filed by Circle K reveals that on Nov. 24, 2025, a customer visited the location at East B... [ More ]