Big Hot Lotto jackpot winner remains mystery

It will be next week at the earliest before Iowa Lottery officials are able to unravel a mystery surrounding a Hot Lotto jackpot that could be worth at least $7.53 million to an investment trust that turned in a valid winning ticket last month.

Crawford Shaw, a New York attorney representing the Hexam Investment Trust that turned in the winning ticket less than two hours before the Dec. 29 deadline, had planned to meet with lottery officials this week but had to delay the trip. Due to another commitment, he would only have been able to spend less than two hours in Iowa, lottery chief Terry Rich said Thursday.

Shaw told The Associated Press on Thursday he cancelled his trip to meet with lottery officials this week because he's handling other matters and, "there's only so many hours in a day."

Shaw was concerned that would not be enough time to answer questions from lottery security investigators and others, so his planned Iowa visit has been moved back, Rich told a news conference called to provide an update on the status of the unresolved Hot Lotto jackpot.

“We have the money; he has the story, and as soon as those two come together, we're ready to pay,” the lottery chief operating officer said, noting that the winner has until Feb. 27 to decide whether to take a cash payment of $7.53 million after taxes or annual after-tax payments of $400,000 for 25 years to collect an annuity valued at nearly $14.3 million on Dec. 29. “We have to know the facts before we pay it,” Rich said.

Shaw isn't the winner himself. He's representing a trust whose details have stayed secret.

Steve Bogle, the lottery's vice president of security, said he has validated the authenticity of the winning ticket and reviewed the security video shot from a Des Moines convenience store camera that documented the purchase by someone who appeared to meet the legal age of 21 to gamble in Iowa. He declined to say whether the purchaser was male or female or to discuss other specifics of his ongoing investigation.

“We will have to meet with the person who purchased the ticket,” said Bogle, a former law enforcement investigator who noted the probe with work backwards from when the winning ticket was turned in at lottery headquarters to the point of sale and include everyone who handled the lottery ticket. “Depending on what Mr. Shaw tells us, this investigation and inquiry could take several more days so we can confirm what he tells us.

“By law the owner is the trust. But we have to meet with each and every person that's had this ticket in their possession,” he added. “Just meeting with Mr. Shaw is not going to be enough for me to give a recommendation to Terry to pay this ticket.”

The fact that the ticket was purchased Dec. 23, 2010, for a drawing held six days later, was the focus on media reports that went nationwide, did not surface until it was sent via FedEx to a Des Moines law firm and then turned in at lottery headquarters 110 minutes before the deadline was set to expire has created a “wow factor” surrounding the situation, Rich told reporters.

“We can barely walk five feet these days without someone asking about this jackpot winning ticket and what's going on with it and when are you going to know,” said lottery spokeswoman Mary Neubauer. “So it's been a bit of an overwhelming process because definitely the public is fascinated by this story and wants to know more.”

Bogle called the situation “unique” and one that has piqued his curiosity as well. “I want to know the travels of this ticket. This is definitely a much more fun whodunit” than mysteries he probed as a law enforcement investigator, he added.

Bogle said the lottery received more than 100 inquiries about the winning ticket, including people claiming it had been stolen from them or they had lost it but he added that none of those claims checked out and there have been no reports from police about complaints that a Hot Lotto ticket had been stolen.

“At this point in time, we haven't got any what I would call credible allegations in that regard,” he said.