PHOENIX – Circle K is suing a Scottsdale store manager and the Arizona Lottery over a jackpot ticket worth $12.8 million.
According to multiple reports citing the lawsuit, a customer ordered 85 tickets for the Nov. 24, 2025, drawing of The Pick at the Circle K on the southeast corner of 56th Street and Bell Road.
After the clerk printed out all the tickets requested, the customer paid for only 60 of them, leaving 25 tickets that were set aside. One of those hit the jackpot for what was the fourth-largest prize in The Pick’s history.
The Pick is a daily drawing that costs $1 per entry to play. Tickets are available at over 3,000 Arizona Lottery retail locations. Odds of matching all six numbers in the game to win the jackpot are 1 in over 7 million.
Why is there a dispute over Arizona lottery jackpot ticket?
The store manager, Robert Gawlitza, realized one of the leftover tickets was the winner and allegedly purchased them for $10 from another employee the day after the drawing.
Circle K filed a lawsuit against Gawlitza and the Arizona Lottery on Feb. 17 asking the court to decide who rightfully owns the ticket, which matched all the winning numbers of 3, 13, 14, 15, 19 and 26.
The Arizona Lottery issued a statement saying the agency is aware of the legal action.
“This is a unique situation and we are not aware of any prior litigation of this sort involving the Arizona Lottery,” the statement said. “The AZL is a nominal party to the lawsuit; there are no allegations of wrongdoing for The Arizona Lottery. The Arizona Lottery is only party to the lawsuit for the purpose of binding the AZL to any court order issued as a result of the suit.”
According to the Arizona Administrative Code governing the state lottery program, “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 resell the ticket, the Lottery shall deem the draw game ticket to be owned by the retailer.”
All Arizona Lottery prizes must be claimed within 180 days of the drawing.
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