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Onondaga County District Attorney's Office
Brothers Nayel Ashkar, left, and Andy Nashkar have been charged in an alleged $5 million lottery scam in New York.
Two brothers who waited six years to claim a $5 million New York scratch-off lottery prize have been charged with scamming the ticket off the real winner.
Andy N. Ashkar, 34, of Camillus, and Nayel N. Ashkar, 36, of Cicero, were arrested Tuesday, accused of conspiring to falsely claim the big prize as their own, authorities announced.
In a news release, Onondaga County District Attorney William J. Fitzpatrick said the real winner bought the ticket at the Green Ale Market, a convenience store in Syracuse owned by the Ashkars’ parents, in October 2006 -- only to be swindled out of it shortly thereafter:
“It is alleged that Andy Ashkar falsely informed this person that he had won $5,000 on said ticket, when in reality said ticket was a $5,000,000 winner. Andy Ashkar allegedly gave the rightful winner $4,000 for his ‘winning’ ticket, keeping $1,000 as a ‘fee.’
"It is further alleged that Andy Ashkar then conspired with his brother Nayel to illegally claim the $5,000,000 from the NYS Lottery Division, even going so far as to inquire if they could ‘avoid the press conference required’ if they accepted less money.”
According to prosecutors, the brothers, who are Palestinian immigrants, tried to cash in on the prize on March 1 at state lottery offices in Schenectady. The prize would have expired March 12.
They were told a security check had to be completed before the winnings could be distributed.
Lottery officials, suspecting something was amiss, then “planted” a story that was picked up by the media about the brothers and the $5 million ticket. They also notified the district attorney’s office about their suspicions.
The press release issued by the state lottery on Oct. 16 was unusual in that it disclosed a lot more information than customary about the purported winners. Usually, the lottery waits to announce a winner’s identity at a press conference.
“Nobody put a fast one over on us,” John Lammers, the enterprise editor of The Post-Standard of Syracuse, told The New York Times. “We were suspicious of this from the get-go. Something was going on.
“We put it on the front page because of all the red flags, and our readers got it immediately.”
In a follow-up Oct. 21 story, the Post-Standard noted that the brothers still hadn’t scheduled a press conference, as required by lottery rules to collect their winnings. They hadn’t responded to phone calls and emails from lottery officials to set it up, lottery spokeswoman Carolyn Hapeman told the newspaper at the time.
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Lottery officials said it’s routine for the lottery’s security unit to investigate for possible fraud whenever the winner is someone related to the owner of the outlet that sold the winning ticket.
“It’s part of our routine procedure to put that on retailer hold, where our investigators contact the folks who presented the winning ticket, and also the people from the store,” Hapeman told the Post-Standard.
She called the six-year lapse before claiming such a big prize “highly unusual.”
In the lottery’s Oct. 16 press release, officials said Andy Ashkar delayed redeeming the ticket until March of this year “out of concern that the winning ticket could negatively influence his life if he did not plan properly before being publicly introduced. Most notably, Ashkar said he did not want the winning ticket to influence his engagement and subsequent marriage. The younger brother also said that during that time, he decided to share his winnings with his brother, Nayel, to show his appreciation for all that Nayel had done for him during his life.”
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Fitzpatrick, the DA, said the story was put out by the lottery’s security division in an attempt to have the real winner come forward.
The actual winner has since come forward and is cooperating with authorities, Fitzpatrick said.
Both Ashkar brothers work as managers at separate central New York auto dealerships, according to The Associated Press. Calls to phone numbers listed for the brothers went unanswered Wednesday morning, as did a call to the convenience store owned by their parents.
The brothers are charged with attempted second-degree grand larceny and fourth-degree conspiracy. Andy Ashkar also is charged with first-degree criminal possession of stolen property.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Leave a Comment:
What ugly men. Ugly acting too. Shame on them
im so surprised! palestinians are such warm, gentle, kind, honest, giving people! (sarcasm)
These two clowns are lucky that our courts don't order that they have their hands removed like they do in they're home country! They couldn't sell cars anymore cause they couldn't open the doors for the customers! Invalidate the green cards and ship these two Marx Bros. wanna be's back home!
I saw an earlier story here about them and a lot of people correctly called the fraud. I gave them the benefit of the doubt, but then again, I have nothing to lose.
Maybe in prison they'll learn how to do the "Gaza Strip".
yes and when they get out, they get a 1 way ticket to their Palestinian homelnd that they immigrated from - without the $5 million!!
Technically, they emigrated from Palestine, and immigrated to the USA. BTW, I do not otherwise disagree with your statement.
Jian 44
Thanks for the catch. Seems my fingers typed faster than brain checked, LOL
I remember reading the story in the paper last month then thought about the Dateline episodes of store owners misleading "real" winners into believing their winning tickets were in fact losing tickets or of lesser value. This one smelled like a rat, no doubt!! Really?? Waiting 5 years to claim it because he did not want it to influence his relationship??? I can see waiting almost a year but not 5 years. Now can we get these lottery officials to work for the IRS to go after millionaire/billionaires who are not paying their fair share of taxes????
Couple of slime balls.
Radical Muslims with a agenda.
or just a couple of greedy people whove become totally American?
So does the original winner get the money?
Yes, he is going to be getting the money.
How did they find out who the real winner was?
yes he will get the money. He will actually make out with an extra $4k (the money that these clowns used to scam him).
Car salesmen trying to scam people out of money? No way!
Beware ! Money will Own you if you aren't careful.
i wouldnt mind being owned
Another thought though, how could the original winner be so gullible as to believe that the ticket was only worth $5,000? Did they not understand numbers? And who pays a fee of $1000 to cash in a $5000 winning ticket? Don't get me wrong, the brothers are crooks, pure and simple, but doesn't the original winner share in the blame by being so foolish as to listen to them? They probably are the type that sends money to the Nigerian guy and gives out their SS number and PIN to "bank employees" that call or email them. With all the information out there on these types of scams, I don't understand how anyone can fall for them.
Maybe they were illegal at the time and didn't want the publicity.
The area that they own their store is an area that have a lot of people that don't speak or write English and is a low socio-economic area. They took advantage of this person is what they did.
When a crime is committed by a white person, their race or religion NEVER comes up as an issue for most of you. As soon as non-white or (God forbid, a Muslim!!) commits a crime, the first thing some of you want to point out their ethnicity, race or religion. In some cases, you attribute their actions to their ethnicity, race or religion. And yet all of you will probably claim to not have any sort of ethnic, racial or religious bias. This is not true of everyone on newsvine, but many of you are just despicable people.
"jihad" to mean "holy war" against the infidel, which defined by the tenets of Islam and the Koran includes all non-Muslims worldwide. Throughout Islamic history, "jihad" has equaled violence and death. Today jihadists are being given the benefit of the doubt by European appeasers who choose to ignore or excuse Islamist atrocities.
Actually they were the ones to bring up religion. They said the reason why they did not claim the ticket back when they realized they had "won" was because of their religious views and because the one son was engaged to be married to a woman through arranged marriage and he didn't want that to influence anything.
Ahhhhhhhhhhh STUPIDITY Crosses all cultural, ethnic,religious and gender lines.........really, car dealer , I dont think that really matters........but I gotta say if you work at a car dealership you most certainly have met every liar , scamer, and bsr on the planet...THE GENERAL CONSUMER
I don't know why NBC included their ethnicity and immigration status. It's not appropriate and not proper journalism. And then comes the anti-Palestinian comments. These are 2 brothers who's parents owned the convenience store. Racism by NBC or by posters does nothing positive.
BradSF,How is anything in this article racist?The article is stating the facts which is that these two brothers are Palestinian immigrant and that they got caught scamming a lotto winner at their parents store.
Hi - I don't know why NBC included their ethnicity and immigration status. This is racism and not appropriate journalism. And then comes the anti-Palestinian comments. NBC's journalism and the comments serve no positive purpose.
I assume they usually favor your more left more pc opinion?
If obama has a son he would look like them. Go ahead, collapse it and hide some more truth. Better yet delete it and appoint Rice to handle the invasion.
wow,Bob.i suppose you must look lke a cross between a warthog and a dodo,though you probably arent nearly smart enough
the person that actually won the money probably couldn't read or speak english...he would have been easy to scam...send these two to prison and then deport them.maybe they can win the lottery in there homeland...or bet on camel races...
Who ALSO shouldn't have been in this country
Went to the same school with these two...they haven't changed one bit...just not being as good at breaking the law as they were when they were younger. This is not a surprise to anyone in our community!
People should photocopy their winning tickets and sign the back of them.Stores don't normally pay out the big winnings.I'm glad that they were caught and the real winner will get their winnings.
Greed greed and more greed and funnier yet is these two idiots took as long as they did to come up with a story for the lottery officials, 6 years! Really.
Being related to the store owners was just a plain giveaway and thankfully the lottery people were on there toes and caught these two would be thief and then found the proper winner of the ticket.
What I would have liked to have known is more about the actual winner in all of this?
Are they indeed immigrants themselves and why did they trust the one brother in the first place when they turned in the ticket. It would help all immigrants big time if they would only learn our languish and laws since they will be here I assume for the rest of there lives.
These guys are so ugly I can only imagine what their parents must look like.
Nice Gentlemen,they should run for office
I called his win a scam last month. No one would wait 5 years to claim
Please,please shut the door on this country.We have enough home grown idiocy without bringing in 3rd world types.What a shock there was a convenience store in the family.