Natsu Matsuri, literally summer festival in Japanese, resembles a type of carnival full of food and games, is a staple of Japanese culture and brings a large turn out each year. A lottery vendor is a typical one, where you pay to draw a number, with certain digits netting impressive prizes.
However this game of chance went wrong, and on 7/28 in Osaka, a 45 year-old lotto vendor was arrested for fraud for selling rigged lotto tickets.
According to police, the suspect set up his lotto stand at a festival on 7/27 around 6:50 PM, and sold rigged lotto tickets for around 90 minutes. In this time, victims lost 14,000 yen (~$140).
The lotto’s rules were simple: 1 play 300 yen ($3), 2 plays 500 yen ($5). You draw a piece of paper and inside was a number between 1~100, and numbers above 55 would be exchanged for prizes like a PlayStation 3, Wii U, and other popular game consoles. In reality, the papers only contained numbers up to 54.
On 7/27, a man who had poured over 10,000 yen ($100) thought suspicious of the vendor and discussed the situation with local police. The next day, police investigated the vendor’s establishment and found no winners. According to police, the vendor had accrued “over 100,000 yen ($1,000) on 7/27.”
Reactions on 2channel:
痛いニュースI’m surprised people thought there were any winning numbers
Don’t go all in w
Has anyone won those things?
80% of those vendors are fraud, I’ve only won cookie cutters and a bobble bottle
Most of those carts are run by the yakuza, aren’t they?
Poured 10,000 yen into that thing? They must be crazy
I’ve never won the top prize, but did get a few second and third places. I won a ZOID plastic model (worth around 4,000 yen) when I was a kid, they all thought I was some kind of hero. Like pachinko, you gotta let some people win, or people get suspicious
I spent around 2,000 yen as a kid and won nothing, the lotto guy said “you should stop now”
>> that’s a great story
I thought this was normal, but now I know I can get them arrested
You’re not buying tickets, you’re buying dreams
I remember crying home spending my 1000 yen allowance, saw another kid win it…
I doubt the prize boxes even have anything in there
He was making 140,000 yen a day, should have thrown a winning ticket for a PS3 in there
You learn your lessons as a kid and you grow up, that’s part of the festival experience. It’s growing up
I’m surprised the cops actually did something about this, I’m more surprised about that