DALLAS — Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton joined the growing chorus of state leaders who are questioning the Texas Lottery, announcing Wednesday that his office will investigate two “suspicious and possibly unlawful” jackpot wins that involved third-party courier services.
The courier services have come under scrutiny in recent weeks, and the Texas Lottery on Monday announced that couriers — a third-party service that allows people to buy lottery tickets virtually — are no longer legal under state law.
Also amid the scrutiny, Texas Lottery Commissioner Clark Smith resigned last week.
The Texas Lottery winnings under question this month have centered on allegations of bulk purchases of tickets through courier services.
In Paxton’s announcement Wednesday, his office said they’ll investigate “if and when any state or federal laws were broken, as well as the process by which the ‘winners’ obtained such a large number of tickets in a short time span.”
“I’m deeply concerned about the integrity of our state’s lottery system, especially when it appears that non-citizens have shown that they are attempting to rig the system to win on demand,” Paxton said. “Texas citizens deserve far better than bad actors getting rich off of a lottery system that is open to exploitation, and we will hold anyone who engages in illegal activity accountable.”
While Paxton’s office did not specify which specific lottery wins he’ll be investigating, the two that have come into focus this month have been a recent $83.5 million lottery win and a $95 million lottery win from 2023.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday announced that he was directing Texas Rangers to investigate both lottery drawings, which were won by a ticket purchased through a third-party courier service.
In the recent $83.5 million lottery win, the winning ticket was purchased through Jackpocket, a third-party courier service owned by the sports gambling company DraftKings. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has questioned how that particular lottery was won, even going to the retail store that sold the ticket and confronting a store employee on video.
In the $95 million lottery win, which happened in 2023, a single entity using a courier service purchased 25 million $1 lottery tickets in less than 72 hours. The move effectively guaranteed victory.
Because the jackpot was so high, the investor doubled its money. The winner opted for the lump sum payment and took home $57.8 million, before taxes.
A Colleyville store sold the winning numbers, 3-5-18-29-30-52. The shop, Hooked on MT, sells only Texas lottery tickets and Montana-themed souvenirs.
The news release from Abbott’s office Monday linked to a News Nation report from October 2024 that detailed how three men from Europe won the jackpot by spending nearly $26 million to acquire “about 99% of possible number combinations.” It wasn’t yet clear if Paxton’s statement about “non-citizens” was a reference to the group from Europe that reportedly won the lottery.
The Houston Chronicle originally reported on the three men’s plan.
The plan, as the Chronicle and News Nation both reported, was legal through a courier service.
Texas legislators have sharply criticized the recent lotteries.
“We can’t gloss over this,” Sen. Paul Bettencourt, R-Houston, said during a finance committee hearing on Feb. 12. “We can’t look the other way. We have to look directly at this. This is, 99 percent probability, money laundering.”
Still, Texas Lottery Commission executive director Ryan Mindell told the panel the commission had limited authority to regulate third-party purchases.
But on Monday, the Texas Lottery Commission changed its tune and declared third-party courier services illegal in Texas. Once the rule is adopted, the commission will revoke the licenses of those retailers using courier services.
The Coalition of Texas Lottery Couriers in a statement called the lottery commission’s announcement “abrupt, disappointing and unnecessary.”
“Lottery couriers have been legally and responsibly operating in Texas since 2019, while always maintaining a transparent and professional relationship with the Texas Lottery Commission,” the group said in a statement. “Throughout this process, the TLC has claimed to have no regulatory authority over courier activities, despite couriers’ persistent requests to be regulated, just as we are in other states.”