Jury Finds Circle K Owes $8 Million for Lotto Ticket Rip-Off

By AMANDA BRONSTAD

Staff Reporter

A jury awarded $7.96 million late last month to a 27-year-old Rancho Cucamonga woman whose former supervisor cashed in her winning lottery ticket for himself.

As reported by the Business Journal last month, the case pitted two of L.A.’s top trial attorneys, Browne Greene and Pierce O’Donnell, in a two-week trial in Pomona Superior Court.

Arwa Farraj purchased a Quick Pick Super Lotto ticket on Dec. 25, 1999, at a Circle K convenience store in La Verne where she worked as a gas station clerk. Her former supervisor, Gurinder Ruby, cashed in an $8 million lottery ticket Farraj purchased after paying her $88 as her winnings.

Farraj sued Ruby and Circle K, which is owned by oil giant ConocoPhillips.

“We asked them to admit the employee was acting in the course and scope of his employment,” said Greene, a partner at Greene Broillet Panish & Wheeler LLP. “They put in his hands all operations, which means selling lottery tickets.”

Greene said he plans to collect the award from Circle K.

O’Donnell, a partner at O’Donnell & Schaeffer LLP, representing ConocoPhillips, did not return calls. Sanford Horn, a Pasadena attorney representing Ruby, declined comment.

The California Lottery, which was initially sued but later dismissed from the case, had already distributed the winnings to Ruby when the ticket was reported stolen.