The Winning Numbers of the Beast

a lot of novelty songs lately. That's ridiculous. We like in the eighties and then into the nineties, we'd have like top like top forty novelty hits, you know, like, um, what about like the Bahama Men, And like, uh, well it's not now how many it was like fifty years ago? Okay, I think that was the two thousands. But yeah, I

get to your point. I'm trying to overestimate because I'll tell people it's ten years ago in the nineties and it wasn't so well, I'm I'm airing on the side of caution when I say fifty years So you're telling me that post Malone is not novelty songs. I'm kidding, Like no, but like you know, Disco Duck and that kind of stuff. Duck, Yeah, all the Duck songs, all the two thousand's next like or just one hit wonder catchy kind of I don't know what we're talking, like

the ninety nine balloons. Sure, no more novelty song actual novel yea, so like rock me on a des By Falco. Right, And here's the thing though, I don't listen to current popular music, so maybe there are a ton of them. Yeah. I was gonna say, maybe you should be over there on TikTok checking out the novelty songs. Maybe you's ridiculous. You don't go on TikTok. There we go, so ridiculous. Well, I got a story for you. It is kind of ridiculous.

I'd love to hear it in the mood always. Okay, how about a story of a man who was famous for hosting a TV game show called Bowling for Dollars and then the same man he went on to be, you know, be the guy, the mastermind if you will, to rig a state lottery. Yeah, it's called the Triple six Fix. And this is a story. It's about as Pennsylvania as it comes. Nice. This is Ridiculous Crime, a podcast about absurd and outrageous capers, heist and cons. It's

always murder free and ridiculous. Elizabeth What do you know about Pennsylvania? Nothing? Nothing, zero. You're in. You're in. Luck. I happen to have a few fun facts for you, isn't it. William penn is the founder, correct, and he likes the woods. That's Sylvania. Yes, we'll get into that. That's the extent of what you know. Okay, Well, Pennsylvania is the fifth most populous state, although the people there will tell you it's actually the fifth most populous commonwealth. Yeah,

it's known these days as a decider presidential elections. It's also home to the Philadelphia Eagles and their battery tossing fans. And it's home to the Steelers, the Flyers, the Penguins, the Harrisburg Senators. Isn't gritty gritty? That's gritty Philadelphia Flyers. Oh and the Four Seasons Total Lands one of my all time favorite things ever. Very good. The Hersy Amusement Park and factory tour. You can see how chocolate gets made,

now beyond sports chocolate. That kind of makes Europeans gag. We have what else we need to know about Pennsylvania crime. Well, you already got into the name part. His name for William penn Sylvania means Penn's Woods. Do you know the story of how it got that name. It wasn't him. He did not name it after himself. Someone else named it.

Penns Woods, right, that's somebody else was King Charles, the second King Charls the second of it was the king of Scotland and the King of England after Oliver Cromwell died. It's a whole deal we want to get into that. The point is in one King Charles, he went over to William Penn's daddy and he's like, hey, man, I know I owe you a bunch of money to help me win back my kingdom. So I owe you some duckets.

How about this, I'll give you some land in the America's And Pops is like, give it to my boy, all right. So he's like cool, gives it to his son. He's like, hey, William Penn, look send the money. I'm a little light on it. I'm gonna give you land in the America's And uh, how about that? And he's like, oh, that's very nice of you, your majesty, thank you very much. He's like, yeah, man, you'll love it. The place has got a ton of trees. I think we should advertise that.

So let's call it William Penn's tree Land now William Penn's Woods. He's like, yeah, yeah, I like that. There it's done. Well. It's like no, no, no no, no, no, no, don't name it after me. I'm a Quaker, so we can't have that. Let's name it New Whales. How about that New Whales's kind of got a whole new vibe to it, and you know, it's the America's everything's new there. And he's like, no, I don't like that. I already got my guys working on it. They're using a good vellum.

So let's just go with williams Pen's Woods. And he's like, no, I bro, come on, your majesty. Could we just name it something other than that? How about okay, pensil Okay Sylvania, Like Elizabeth said, that's a good one. And he's like Kings, like, no, I don't know. I told you got the charter going. He's like, okay, I'll split it with you. Pensnsylvania my Sylvania, and he's like I love it, and eventually got shortened to Pennsylvania. Now. I spent a lot of time Pennsylvania

as a kid. I like Pennsylvania a bunch, just like on your own yourself. I took my bindle hobo hopped onto like a train going east, and I didn't stop until we ran out of continent. And then I was like, back up a state, Take me to Pennsylvania. No, I have a cousin. I haven't. I have a whole family. But they have a whole family lives in a camp Hill, Pennsylvania, which is just near Harrisburg, which is the capital of Pennsylvania.

So I would be there hanging out around the same time that the star of today's story was just getting out of prison where he'd been spending his time for fixing the state lottery. And now I'd like to introduce you to the former host of Bowling for Dollars and the hero of our day, Nick Perry. Nick Perry, that's not his government name. Government name was Nicholas Perry Katson Faunas.

He was Greek. Yeah, yeah, heeded. The dude was a World War Two veteran navy man, tough guy, you know, like actual, you know, Assault of the Earth gets back from the war and he's like, what am I gonna do? It's a new country. You know, I'm gonna get involved in this radio I think I got a good voice for radio, gets involved. Then there's a new medium that pops up called television. He's like, hey, I'm gonna bounce

over to that. So he starts working at the television station from Pittsburgh, gets a job and he's hosting a live televised Polka party. Yeah. First television station of Pittsburgh's like, you know what, we need live polka? So this is about, you know, nineteen fifty Okay. In night he gets hired to become this new thing that's been invented called a TV announcer. He's like, yeah, I'm gonna be this guy I announced And they're like, okay, that's cool. What are

you and that stuff on TV? Talking about it? So I guess his job at Pittsburgh station w T A E. Now w T A E. This is where he becomes what you might call Pittsburgh famous. This is where he gets his shows. The two most popular shows in Pittsburgh television at the time, Bowling for Dollars and Championship Bowling. He's a bowling guy. Oh big, Now can you guess what Bowling for Dollars was? Like? I think I think they may have had a version out here. I believe

I remember when I was a little kid. One it's stayed a popular idea. Yeah in the so I don't know, I don't I just remember the name of it. I don't remember the show itself. Imagine family feud with no questions and instead bowling balls. So they're just like your families competing a bowling man. So it's just like semi pro bowling. It's like amateurs. But then they also have, like you know, they have the whole fani le vibe, like come on, mom, pick up that seven tent split

all right, exactly, and it's just visiting. Well, is it's corny. I'll admit it's totally corny, and it's a lot of fun to watch. We'll we'll put up a clip on Instagram so you can see what this looks like. It is worth it just for the fashion a loan because the clips were gonna put up. Or from the seventies, which is love It, Love It great oranges greens you haven't seen since then. So now you can imagine Pittsburgh

in the nineteen seventies. You this guy Nick Perry, He's been a fixture in the Pittsburgh scene for a while, and we get into the seventies and Pittsburgh's cooking along even though everything's not really going well for the city in terms of the steel industry is shutting down, so it's a hard time for this, you know, industrial city, this blue collar city. Nick Perry is there for the people. He keeps them Pittsburgh proud, got it right now, Just

give you a sense of this. When he would go on to his show, he loved to like play up as being a TV announcer. He made sure that he was brought on with the right flair. So he had this this catchphrase you would always hear, and they say, it's the man with all the dollars, the kingpin himself, Nick Perry, right, just the cheesy right now. The newspeople at the station, they still love this guy. He was like, you know, not he's you know, not a hard journalist,

but he's not just like a hand that. They're like, oh, that's totally one of the crew. And they love him because he loves Pittsburgh and Pittsburgh loves him. The news anchor Stu Emery at w t A, it's such a good news anchor name do you remember here with the traffic on the fives we'll be back with weather. His real name is like Philibert FT News, so Philibert FT. He said, and I quote Nick Perry was very Pittsburgh, and he was very Pittsburgh and his questions and the

kind of people who were on the show. He was down to earth and humorous and fun and his strong personality came through and he was just about his dapper and restaurant as I had seen. All right, Yeah, we put a little more on Pepper on this also a dapper dresser now w t A E News director Joe Raveto he also had something to say about the what we call the essence of Nick Perry. Joe Rovito said, and I quote Nick became a local star with bowling

for dollars. That was his real breakthrough to the public. He did a beautiful job with it. He was very knowledgeable, a bowling enthusiast. He took it all very seriously. It was a big deal of him, and he was a very conscientious guy. As a reporter, anchor and host of that program. Knows he calls him a reporter because he talks to people. Yeah, reporter. Now during the seventies, as I said, he becomes this beloved figure the city needs him.

He loves Pittsburgh bowling for dollars. To give you a sense of this, it was regularly drawing more viewers during its nighttime broadcast than the nighttime news at the time on all of the other stations. Yeah, that's they're like, we don't need to know what Gerald Ford said about inflation. Just give us this of intense splits exact escap Nick Perry also would turn to the people of Pittsburgh who go out there, give them some love. They give him some love that I kind of like to picture it

like you've seen Anchorman, the Will Ferrell movie. So swap San Diego for Pittsburgh news anchor for bowling for dollars, and you basically got the vibe. That's what it sounds like. Okay, So in V one we get our big complication, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. They decided to snatch business away from all the mobbed up numbers runners. And they say, you know what, we can do this, We can do bad all by ourselves. So they come up with the Pennsylvania

State Lottery. Now this is a thing at the time. A lot of the numbers and for those who don't know numbers, Elizabeth is a game where somebody would basically draw random numbers and then everybody in the community they would be guessing what those numbers would be right every day, and so this was what the lottery replaced. It was basically the local numbers game, and you had you go to your numbers guy and tell the numbers you think

you're gonna win. And the numbers were picked usually from like either a racetrack, how the finishes of horses went, or some something in the newspaper. It would be something that nobody could control, so that way everybody could see whatever is occurring. Well, the lottery needs this same type of thing, so they decide, you know what, We're gonna

do a TV show and we'll broadcast the numbers. And so they have this nightly broadcast that will show the winning numbers as their drawings, so everybody can see it at the exact same time and they know nothing hanky going on, right, So who do you think they pick to host this show? Did w T A S. Nick Perry? Ye? So Nick Perry, he's selected as the announcer at this farmer World War two veteran. This he's also, by the way,

a like a Sunday School kind of guy. He he's a choir leader at his church, like Salt of the Earth. Good guy. Right, And three years later a grand jury would determine that Pennsylvanias should bring charges against Nick Perry for colluding to rig the state lottery. So had what happened in this time? And now I'd also like to point out that this dude had the rank to merity to rig the lottery and to rob the lottery live

on the air. Oh right, allegedly all allegedly, but I guess I would say allegedly, because so he did it. He did it, the state says. So, now, after this short break, we'll get into the triple six fix of the Pennsylvania lottery. He doesn't do you like to play the lottery? Z babies? Uh? You know I always talked to people about how I've talked to everyone random I stopped. People know I always wants to talk about the lottery.

I've said many many times. I have this plan if I won the lottery, like how I would divvy up the money. And I don't want it to get into it now proprietary information, but I'd be really good at winning the lottery if I ever bought a ticket, thoughts you just said about to ask you have these plans, but do you play? No, you can't win if you don't play. That's that the ads tell me, yeah, right now. And then they'll say like warning, you know, if you

have a gambling problem, don't do this. Do you have a gambling problem? Is that way? You don't do it? No? I don't know. Okay, Well for you, those are the people who don't know about lotteries. They have various ones. There's the scratch off kids, right, and then there's like the the weekly draws, like the Mega millions where you pick six numbers, and then there are smaller lotteries. They are more based on what I was talking earlier about the numbers game, where they have what's called the daily

Number or the daily draw. Right. So the daily draw, a person goes in Pennsylvania, at least they go and they buy a ticket, and they can spend between fifty cents and five dollars on this ticket, and then they can pick a certain amount of numbers based on how much they spend, and they get to pick three numbers, so the numbers between zero and nine and the order of the numbers matters. So if you put three, one, four and the numbers are one four three that are drawn,

you don't win. It's got to be exactly the way. So there's there's two forms. It's the numbers and the order. Right at one minute before seven pm every night, Nick Perry and a local senior citizen go onto the w t a E set and they appear on screen and the senior citizen gets to select at random the numbers. And keep in mind the senior also gets picked at

random from all of the area senior citizen's homes. They don't go and pick the most like charismatic, They just pick citizens at random and they put them on TV Summer Winners Summer completely. You should look up on YouTube w t A E. Daily. Yesterday, I'll put up one clip of the moment when the rigging occurred, and you can see the how it goes. How it so this randomly selected senior citizen who gets to go up there

and randomly select the balls. They're supposed to stand there as the balls are and if you've seen this, they'll be in like a clear like bubble and they'll be bouncing around. And so for this one, each number has its own bubble. So there's zero, three, nine balls and each one they're all jumbling around and all of a

sudden once shoots up to the top. And the senior citizen is in charge of turning it around to the camera can see it, which is not the job I'd give them, but you know, it works out for some great fun. And when you watch now, if you have all three winning numbers and you get them in the order they were selected, you could win five hundred dollars for every dollar you bet. So the most you can win is two dollars from two thousand five day. Sorry, quickly redo my math there. Yeah, you load up your

tickets all right now. If you don't, you dots you get the two anyway. So lottery officials in the TV station, everybody's taking these daily drawings very seriously. There's millions of dollars riding on it, right. So the machines they get locked up after each drawing. They have like a whole special space. They're locked up in the space that has two keys required to open the lock, just like a nuclear submarine watching nukes. The Pennsylvania Lottery official they had

a turn a key. The w C A E. People turn a key. And also, by the way, the official would regularly, the state official lottery official would regularly visit w t A, and they would check the machines, check the balls, and make sure everything was up to code. I bringing up up to stuff. They take the locks. So they didn't know when these periodic inspections would be. They don't know when the ball checkers are coming exactly. Nobody knows when someone's gonna show up going. I'm here

to check your balls, totally totally random the States balls. Meanwhile, by the way, since you were focus on the balls, the State's balls, they were measured in wide and determined always to be exactly. Can you guess how much would it be a pink pong ball? Ways, no, good guess? One point seven five milligrams. Now, for comparison sake, a dollar bill weighs about a gram, So it would take about five hundred and seventy lottery balls to weigh them

same amount as one dollar bill. That's how light these things are, five hundred and seventy of them anyway, so they made sure that they all were exactly the same weight. Close good guess? Good guess? Well, I can tell you about it now it's not gonna be easy to rig a lot of getting ahead of it's fun. Don't mind your getting ahead yourself. The science is there to ponder. It is right there before us, which is how are

you going to get these balls? And you've got a senior citizen working as like your helper as your stage assistant. Can't be something that they're gonna mess up. So what do you do to rig this? Right now? Nick Perry, He's like, okay, I got an idea for big pay day. We rigged the lottery. Now he's facing the same question you're asking. He's like, but how do I do it? He's like, okay, and you know what I need? First? A money man. So he's like, okay, I'm gonna get

two for the price of one. He happens to have these two childhood friends. They're called the Moragos Brothers. The Morogos Brothers are a pair of like basically Greek small time hoodlums, and they're Peter and Jack Moragos. They run a cigarette vending machine business with Nick Perry. So they take Nick Perry's legitimate money and they run it through this vending machine business and they, you know, they get a little business juice. Right. So he comes and he's like, hey, guys,

I got a new business venture. They're like, tell us all about it, Nick, and like how they've gone. How Nick has gone from like hey, everybody do He's got two faces. So this Nick Perry, he goes, okay, you guys, you're down, and they're like, we do business. We trust you. You You say it's a good idea, We're gonna do it. We're in. So he's like, okay, I got my I got my money. Man. So then he goes, okay, now what else do I need? I need an inside guy.

So he's like, okay, this is gonna get difficult, this is risky. This is where I can all. I can blow it all right here, so I gotta be smart about this. It's like, okay, I know who I need. He goes and sidles up to fifty two year old Pennsylvania Lottery official Edward Level, like, hey, man, looking good in them chinos today? You ever thought about some bell bottoms? With those? I can get you in a green number. He's just sexually harassing him. Okay, you fill up the

bell bottomed boy, get you a turtleneck. Looking good anyway. So this dude Edward Plevel. He's essentially the security guard who's in charge of guaranteeing these machines have nothing going wrong with them at the ball's way exactly one point seven five milligrams. And so going to him is that's the move right? Clevels like you wanta do what? Hey? I like it? Plevels into it. He wants to get right. So he's like, okay, now I got my money guy, I got my inside guy. I need a fixer. I

need a tech specialist. So who can make this all happen? Nick Perry turns to someone friend of the show close to him. He's like, hey, the w t a e art director. I was thinking this, Oh look at you, criminal mastermind. So Joseph Back, the art director and renowned for his hands painting, really good with hand painting, especially the campagnted letters and so forth, and which is as an art we've discussed. Perry sidles up to Joe Back one day. He's a gay man, how you doing? I

really like that leather Jackie harassing everybody where? Did you get them shooting? He's like, hey, man, what would you say if I told you I could? You could make a hundred thousand dollars. Joe back looks him up and down in the most Pennsylvanu way possible. He listening me, says, who do I have to kill? Oh? I think that it was going to be an indecent proposal. I ain't laying down for this one. But someone's gone out. So he's like, all right, I can make a hundred the

easy way or the hard way with no wet work. Okay. So he's into it. He's like, what do I gotta do? He's like, I want you to swap some balls. He's like, swapa, this is getting a little interesting. Nick, what kind of balls are we talking here? And he's like, I'll come back to the gutter yea, and show me those pants again. Spin around. He drops one of the balls on purpose and take it up a little smack on the tish.

So Nick Perry, he gives Joe Buck a scale and he goes, Okay, I need you to go buy thirty ping pong balls. I want you to weigh them. Just go to any sporting good store, paint them to match the official lottery balls. You gotta number the seven, the eight, and nine to match exactly, and you won't be able to take home an example, so you have to do it for memory. And he's like, bro hand painted letter is my jam I got this? So Joe back, He takes the thirty ping pong balls, he takes the scale,

He goes home, and he gets to work. Now, of course it's gonna acquire a little experimentation. He's like, how am I gonna do this? So he tries, like, first, powder, seems like, maybe I can put a powder coating on it and I'll make the balls different the way, different amounts. That doesn't work. He's like, how about an applicate. Maybe I can put like an applicat on there that like the sticker is heavy. That doesn't work. He's like, I

got it white latex paint, right, basically house paint. He's like, I'm gonna his house paint. So he injects the ping pong balls with latex paints and then paints the outsides and so he can make the fake balls. They would all still bounce and jumble around in the machine, but they won't. Only one ball will be lighter than all the other nine, Like, there's nine balls in there. I

guess ten balls in there. There nine and then he has one ball that's not waited, so all the rest they will bounce around and float because there he has them. He's been experimenting make sure that they will bounce around. Only one has the lightness to make it to the t C. I was thinking like he would maybe paint the numbers on there with like he'd put some sort of metal into the paint and make it heavier paint. Oh, that's a really good idea. Yeah, they did not go

with metal paint. They just decided to. They didn't call me, no, they really should have. Unfortunately you weren't born, so that is part of the that was a little difficult. So anyway, they decide add weight to nine of the ten balls in each machine, and they pick weight. We can't do that. We've got to let there be two balls because if it's just one ball, it'll be very obvious. So we'll mix up two balls. And then the odds are basically

only a few combinations. So they pick the four and six balls to not doctor and they don't do the rest. So now they're only eight combinations that could possibly be the winning combinations for those like yourself and I with the math skills. We have. The combinations end up being triple four four four six four six four or four six six, or they are six four four six four six six six four and lastly the best combo triple six six six six, the winning numbers of the beasts exactly.

So now all this left to do is purchase some lottery tickets to it. So the Moragos brothers now come back into the picture. So if they go and they meet up Nick at the local St. Nick's Orthodox Church, because that's for all the good criminal conspiracies go down. He's like, meet me in a pu seven. So they slide on behind the pew behind them, they start talking about how to buy tickets. They exchange for like their

cigarette concession business profits and here's your recent payments. He's like, okay, here's the plan. Keep the profits, go buy a bunch of lottery tickets. They're like, oh really. He's like yeah, but hey, we're gonna do this like real LaCOSA Nostra mafia stuff. Spread it out. Be smart about to go to one person and buy ten thousand dollars worth of tickets. It's like, okay, okay, we're gonna go to Philly. He's like, wait minute, you gonna go to Philly. Why did you

go to Philly. That's Nicky Scarfolk's place. Don't go to Phillies Like, that's why they'll think it's the mob. They'll put it on Nicky Scarfolks. Brilliant. He's like, actually that's pretty good. Pittsburgh may come back to us. Go to Philly. They're gonna go to Philly and buy up all the tick sets now to maximize their score. The Morago's brothers smart hoodlumps they are. They're like, okay, how about we take out a bank loan and really out here. So

they take out a twenty dollar bank loan. Don't tell Nick Perry. They go and buy a bunch of more tickets. Now they got this extra twenty grand and all the money Nick Perry front of them. And they go and they pile into their giant white Cadillac because nobody's gonna remember that, and they tour around the Filly area and they buy up all the lottery tickets that they can afford.

Do you think they did like method acting or like, you know, I just imagine that they get out of the car and they go into the little convenience store and their play their play acting, like oh, someone told me I should play the lottery. I never do this. Let me buy. I don't know how many should maybe two. My grandpappy sent me down here to buy some lottery tickets. I don't know anything about it, but his favorite numbers are four and six. Could you help me figure them out?

And they just keep doing this, and then they have to wear costumes and disguises from shop to shop. I wish they did that. You're gonna be so disappointed with what they actually did. Oh yeah, So they purchased fourteen dollars in one dollar tickets and they're now looking at basically about a four point two million dollar come up if the tickets hit, and they will hit because it's fixed. So yeah, exactly. So later on in that same day there will be the daily draw because they have to

get the tickets for that same day. So they're all trying to get this all done before the seven o'clock draw. They get it all done, and that's when Nick Perry steps onto the w t a E Set, ready to do his part to rig the state lottery. Everyone else has done their parts, it's time for Nick Perry. He catches SIGHTE a lottery official, Ed Plevil lottery official gives him the nod exactly a lot of the sting. He's like, okay, gives them the nose swipe. They use the two keys.

They unlocked the lottery machine storage area. They am so nervous. Right now, we o the machines up to the TV station set plevel. He leaves the machines and the balls unattended, just, you know, just walks away. I gotta go move my car. He's gone for thirty minutes now. Normally they bring the senior citizen on to the set to practice during this time with the machines while the cameras are on. Instead, they don't. They leave the senior citizen in the green

room for the full thirty minutes. Nobody tells her what's going on, so she's just sitting and there, confused, like what's coming now? Que Joe back in action. The art director does his part. Joe back passes the weighted balls to a stage hand and asked the stage hand to put the doctor balls into the machine. Possibly a mistake, possibly not change out. The stage hand is in on it. He's been contacted, so box the stage hand act fast.

He's like, I need a guy to help me. So they make their move, they get the balls in, they swap out the other balls. Everything's going huge pay days lined up for everybody involved to pull it off. Nobody sees them. Now we are a few minutes before seven pm. It's time for the daily Draw. If you can believe it, can you guess how many people are watching? Oh like

nine million people, very close six six million people. Six million people tune in to watch those lotty numbers, which is more than all the other news stations are getting at this time. So every most to Pittsburgh that is watching TV at this time is watching this event. And now wait a second, this is a state lottery, state lottery, so this is actually all over that's just at the station.

There's six million. It's just six million people watching this station, and that so that it's broadcast at other stations, broadcast throughout yest it. I'm slow good, don't cool with it. So now the daily draw. They had the local senior citizen. I told her she's waiting in the green room. Well, her name is Violet Lowry, and they say, Violet Lowry, could you please come up to the set, And so she was like okay, she calls on up there, so

we have viol Lowry creeping up to the set. Joe Buck is on the and the wings watching, the stage hand is watching. Nick Perry is waiting on the set for her to get there. She's the last piece of this puzzle. All she has to do is take the weighted balls and turn them around in the right order. And after this quick break, I'll tell you what happens when she steps onto the Okay, Elizabeth, yes I left you. We were at the W T A E. Set. The

tensions were hot. Oh I am on pins and needles this whole all those ads played and it went on for a really long time, and the pins and the needles have been puncturing my bed. D Well, I'm here to relieve you of that pain and anxiety. Thank you. I want you to picture it. Oh, yes, close your eyes. Eighties something year old Violet Lowry arrives on set. She shows up ready to pick some numbers. She's there for the balls. She's escorted from the green room, where she

has been asked to wait for half an hour. Finally it's six. Someone takes herund to the set. The stage hand rolls the large lottery machines into play. Nick Perry stands off stage, ready to do his bit, waiting for ast two. At sixty nine, the announcer goes to work. It's the man with all the dollars, the king pit himself, Nick Perry, Lottery official Ed plevel leads Violet Lowry to the lottery machines. The machines kick on on the bubble.

The balls start going. There's all this frenetic action. The fans are kicked to life and everything that. Everyone's excited. The ping pong balls bouncing against each other. What's gonna happen? The balls start to lift on this currents of air. They're all jumbling around. Looks perfectly normal. Then, as Nick Perry explains the game to those watching, I quote, good evening everyone, It's time for the live drawing up the daily number Thursday. Each of our three machines contains ten balls.

Numbers zero to nine will draw one digit from each machine. Now mix the balls in the first machine and the second, and now the third machine. Drawing tonight will be Senior Citizen bio Let Lowry are supervising comes of a state Lottery Security Officials District Manager Ed Plebo. Violet Lowry watches the doctor balls jumping around and tumble. She looks a little intimidated. The first ball lists up the shoot and

Will kind of goes do it. She lives over. She twists the number around and she shows, oh, it's a six, and now Violet draw the first digit please sex, and the second digit six, and now the third digit six, and there you have it. Pennsylvania's daily lottery number is six six six. If you've got it, come and get it. If not, better luck tomorrow. Just like that, the lottery had been robbed. Is the winner. Nick Perry and his group they all go excited. They've done it. They've rigged

the state lottery. They're all about to be millions of dollars richer, and six million people watched them do it at home, and Hazels like, oh my god, I just unleashed the beast. I pulled six six six, like I's in there with like holy water. No one's going to talk to her after that. I can't. My church group will not. Something was going to happen to Hazel when you were doing your little story. I didn't mean to worry.

Yeah it's okay, so Edd plebble. He goes and re secures the machines, they take the two keys, they lock it back up. Now, just before that, he had to have enough time for Joe Bach to slide in there, grab the Doctor Balls machines, switch back in the original balls, and then make his escape. Allows us to have a couple of moments for him to do that. Then they lock up the machines. So now Joe back, he takes

the Doctor Balls home. He piles the balls into an empty paint can sets them all on fire, destroying any evidence. Smart dude, Right, yeah, that's good. We've gotten rid of at least one of the So now it's time to collect the winnings. The Marago's brothers re into the picture. They climb back in their land yard. The giant white caddy cruise on over to Philly looking to pick up their money, and the brothers they drive around collecting their

cash pay days. And then they come back to Pittsburgh and they meet in the cemetery and they secretly meet Nick Perry and they give him the first part of his cut. Now, do you know where they were picking up the pay They didn't. They wouldn't. They have to go to the state capitol, to an office somewhere or local lottery tickets, so yeah, they could do. They go to the store where they bought it in the store has to pay it up. I don't know if the

store had to pay it up. But they went around collecting and so in all the news stories seemed that they were getting from the stores, there's like local lottery offices. I think maybe maybe there were local lottery I did not look into who they are actually redeeming the tickets with a scale. Yeah, and I know you're into like the paperwork. I was just like to get the money,

all right. So they bring him thirty five tho dollars in a brown paper bag and they handed to him in a cemetery, you know, like, here's your first cut. This will just be one of many envelopes to come. He's like, I got it. And they got a couple of days to collect their winnings. You don't have to get it all that the first day. So they're taking their time, right. No one was the wiser at first, but someone had noticed, and that someone was named Anthony Gross.

So Gross. Now I want you to know about this man, Anthony Grosso. He knew something about rig games because he had served time in prison for racketeering. He later would serve time after these events for quote, tax evasion and violating federal gambling loss. He was what you would call a mobster, Big Anthony, Big Anthony, real live mobster, not part of like the Scarfolk family. But he had been legitimately running a numbers game for forty years, a local

numbers game. And the interesting part is that the Moroco's brothers thought, you know what, we should rob him while we're doing this. Yeah, and you know how the brothers when Pennsylvania created the lottery, what they had done was to basically take over the numbers game from the mob. The mob was pretty much, you know, various mobs, but it was just say, for the sake of time, the mob. They took over all the bookmakers and numbers runners and they said, okay, hey, how about give us the money?

Were the state and people were like okay, cool. The mobs like no, no, no, no. How much do they pay? And when you win? Is it one of those education lotteries where they go to senior citizens California's education the exactly because this part of the look see where the money is going? Keeping Violet lotry going. They called her Hazel it's violent. Violet. Yeah, sorry, sorry violent, she's not here to hear it. So Anthony grows our real live

mobster and he uh and his ilk. They hear that the Pennsylvania State Lottery is trying to take over their millions of dollars industry. They're like, what are those mooks doing? Okay, how much did they pay out? When you win? People are like, oh, hey, Big Anthony, they pay five dollars to one. Okay, here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna pay six. So they run the exact same lottery off of the state's lottery numbers and they say, you pick the numbers and you buy the ticket from us, we'll

pay six one. They turn the state lottery back in legitimate. So what this means is that the Moroco's brothers knew this. So they're like, hey, if we go take some of the mob tickets, we'll get paid six hundred to one instead of five to one. So they get greedy and they go and buy mob tickets and then they come back to them Bob and they're like, hey, pay up. Oh that is a recipe for disaster. So Big Anthony he's like, um, not too into this. He's like, how

how dare these people rob me? Big? Anthony grows, So, I've been in the numbers games since they will knee hid to Grasshoper. So he then decides to do what all mops as you do in a pinch. He turns to the state and he said, hey, you should investigate these guys. He goes right to the state. They're totally using the infrastructure for their benefit, either to ride their lot of setup or to be their enforcers. That's that's wise, straight Pennsylvania. Those are guys ding ding Dan. So Anthony grows.

So when that first move fails in the State's like, look, look, we don't want people to think that the state. You're saying it's rigged. We don't have proof of that. We can't have people believing it's rigged. This is a new thing. We think you're a mobster and you watch your game back, so why don't you blow anything? Gross was excuse me? He's like, Okay, it's no problem. I got other avenues. So he goes to the journalist. He's like, hey, journalists,

I got a story for you. The state knows that the lottery has been rigged, and they don't want to investigate. So the journal starts writing about say it's like damn it. So then now like, okay, they announced a big investigation, right. The investigation is basically a show trial. It's not really intended to do anything. Anthony Grosso is really disappointed in this development. So Anthony gross So keeps the pressure on,

so he starts a newspaper. So he just keeps basically funneling stuff because he not only he figures out who did it. He knows it was the Morogua's brothers. He knows who was involved and who took his money. So he's like, look it's this guy, it's that guy, Go go follow this paper trail. Finally, in September, newspaper story

from the area reports quote. Allegations that the a drawing may have been tampered with first surfaced in early May, when Anthony Grosso, who has been called the numbers kingpin in Pittsburgh by the State Crime Commission, told reporters that the drawing had been fixed. Organized crime figures had noticed

heavy betting on numbers using the four six combination. After the news stories broke and talk of the triple six fix spread all across Pennsylvania, all of them, Bob gets interested, and of course now the state can't ignore it, so they're like, damn it. So the investigators started actually doing an investigation. Now after doing the fake investigation back in May, now in September they do a real investigation. They go around and they go to a bar club called the

Do drop in. Oh I like that, man, I knew you would. Now I have a really quick question. They only rigged at the one time, right, yes, ing at the one time to get the four million payday. And so even if you didn't buy the ticket from the Mob, if you took the ticket to the mob, they pay out. You got to buy a mob. You buy a Mob tickets. And did they buy Mob tickets the Mob tickets and took it? The Mob said pay us six to one. Basically because you rigged the lottery that you're now doing,

you have essentially Roby got it. They're like, you're gonna bring us in on your fix. Yeah, and you're not going to bring us in on your fix, you dumb moose. So the owner of the Dude drop in. He when the investigate investigators are making news in the press, he calls the state and he goes, you know, what. There were these two suspitious man in a big white Cadillac who showed up at my place. They bought thousands of dollars of tickets, which they weren't supposed to do. The

tickets all had the same combination. It is all for us and six is like they're saying in the news. And then they bought the tickets. But then it was the interesting thing was they called somebody and then they held the phone up to the machine so they could hear the tickets being printed. And then they spoken some foreign language over the phone with the person they were talking to, the foreign language being Greek. So wait, they used the phone at the Dude drop in. Can we

call Nick Perry cell phone? So they say, hey, can we use your house phone? I gotta call my boss real quick. Also, by the way, you get a couple of thousand dollars of tickets because we're lazy, We're not going to go to a couple of hundreds were remember us in our big white caddy. Also, an employee of the Dude drop In recalled for the investigators, who then showed up to go what do you have for us? Oh? Yeah, man,

there's these two guys in a big white Catillac. They had a very memorable platinum blond with them from what I recall. So they're doing everything you're not supposed to do, and the state investigators go, hey, do you guys have

a phone records? They're like, oh, yeah, yeah. So they pulled up the phone records and the phone call from the dude drop in goes to Pittsburgh TV station wt So the investigators then go him out and immediately arrest the Moraguos brothers, who then immediately turned state's evidence and flip on their childhood friend Nick Perry. Charges against the Moraguos brothers are dropped, charges that are then filed against Joe Bach part director, Ed Plevel, the lottery state official,

and Nick Perry. The news team at w t a E has to break the news while Perry is in the building, they go, they go with the breaking news. While he's there, he can look up and see the monitor like see himself, Like, well, that's not good, and then liked, did he get arrested at the station. Well, here's how it plays out. So w t a E news director Joe Raveto has to make the tough call. He's like, it's news. We gotta run it. It's even though he's in the in the building and this will

be insensitive, we gotta run it. So they break the news. Nick Perry is there and he based really leaves and Sally Wiggins was the anchor at the time, and she's like, he's really nervous and did not want to do it. Joe Rivito was talking and he's like, look, you gotta do it. And I quote, here's how Joe Rivito remembered it. I knew he was sitting right upstairs, a guy I had known worked with. It was a very difficult period personally, professionally.

It was a tough juggling act to do the right thing. Because of the fact we were the station that carried the lottery, because of the fact we knew Nick, we felt we had to pursue the story aggressively. It was a sad thing because here's a guy. You wipe that off the slate who was a really terrific guy. He was a terrific employee. But you can't wipe that off. This one thing has ruined this guy's life. It will smear this guy's life. He's done it and I knew it that day. So he's like I gotta do the

right thing. They bust him out, so the Morago's brothers. Meanwhile, they end up skating on all the charges. Nick Perry gets arrested, Joe Bak gets arrested, and Level gets arrested. Nick Perry. He's tried, convicted, and sentenced to three to seven years in prison in camp Hill, Pennsylvania. Ed Plevill gets two to seven years for his part. Joe back

pleads guilty as well. Now, Nick Perry, when he left the courthouse, it was hard for his fans to imagine at the host of bowling for dollars when rigged the state lottery, and he would do it in such beautiful fabrics. It was just an insult to the Pittsburgh populace. Now, one fan wrote to the local newspaper, and I quote, He's like Joan of Arc being burned at the steak. I can't see why sixty three year old man who has a good living and is established in the community

would do something like this. It's like Joan of Arc. Yes, he broke their hearts, so he had visions God told him to rob the lottery. Good It's like I must do this for the sake of Pittsburgh. So of course there's a movie of this whole ordeal because it's cinematic. Now, the film is called Lucky Numbers. It's loosely based on the Nick Perry story. In this case, the guy is a Harrisburg TV weather man and he's not the Pittsburgh host of Bowling for dollars. And in the film he's

also kind of he's desperate for a big score. Was Nick Perry just kind of comes upon the idea? And uh, now can you guess who played the Nick Perry figure in Lucky Numbers? When was the movie? When the movie come out? The movie came out a while back. Oh, well that that clears it up for me. That's not a big in in the theater. So like more than thirty years ago, give me a decade the nineties. Okay? Uh did it have? Did they film the movie before this happened? In? All right? So in the he could

fly his own plane to the theater. Harrison Ford, no bigger plane. So Nick Perry gets played in real life by John Travolta in a movie nobody's ever heard of movie of his life therebgh. Now, Dick Perry eventually does return to where he'd first found fame and acclaim and fortune bowling Lanes. The old sponsor for Bowling for Dollars was a loyal and true friend was Whisman Bowling Supplies. Whisman Bowling Supplies did not give up on him. They decided to hire him as a salesman. So he got

a job. And his buddy Robert Whisman, a true true friend, tick the once beloved it now disgrace Bowling for Dollars announcer. And he said, and I quote, I couldn't have had anyone better. He was an asset to the business. Good buddies like. Look, they locked up his records. And firstly, I would say, Nick Perry's about his Pittsburgh as the

three River Stadium. That guy, I just love him. Fun fact, since that fateful day in ninety when Nick Perry and his crew rigged the Pennsylvania State lottery, those same winning numbers have come up. Six six six has come up a few times. It's actually come up twenty four different subsequent drawings, and every single time the people they call it a Nick Perry. In fact, anything six six in certain parts of Pittsburgh and other parts of Pennsylvania is known.

It's still referred to as a Nick Perry. Everywhere else it's the number of the Beast, but in Pittsburgh it's Perry. He's a beast six six. So Elizabeth, what does our ridiculous takeaway here? You know? I think, well, it's it's kind of a funny thing. He did a lot of people dirty, right, so, like the station gave him this cool show and everyone loved it. By the way, the

station lost the lottery to that. They said, you guys can't be trusted to show this anymore, so, you know, and then now I'm wondering about the bowling supply guy. What's he skimming off the top? I don't trust this man. I noticed this didn't what did the what did the news director say? He did it to himself, Like, yeah, it's one of those, like I would say, Shakespearean tragedies, but it's kind of well know, you know what it's like is it's like Joan of arc Yeah, that's really

like that's the best analogy. When before you read me that quote, I was like, my it just feels like Jean, which who's the dauphin them on fire? My ridiculous takeaway would be never ever, And I mean never ever, ever, ever rob the mob. Oh yeah, that's all these dudes had to do. The Morocco's brothers. If they would have just said, hey, baby, you stay home, we're gonna get our rental card. We're gonna go and get some tickets.

We'll be back at six o'clock. You know, everything will be cool, they're like, no, baby, getting the backut on your best for coke, because we're going to Philly to exactly. They got the caddie all shined up and they took that love boat for a cruise and they're like, nobody will remember this because we're gonna have this day. It's so memorable. You know. They decided to get rich on all this mob money and they blow it for everyone. But they didn't end up buying anything or do anything.

They nobody got anything out of this. They get all greedy and then they don't do anything. The greed was just the feeling if I can't It's like it's that idea that your imagination will doom you, either with fear or with greed. On it's your imagination, Like, don't listen to that. Let the reality of the mob dictate your decisions. Should I rob the mob? I think I'd get away with it. Only the mob can have the mob's money. That's the rule of the mob. That's our money. Will

kill you for that. So yeah, they're lucky they didn't get Oh no, yeah, they got very lucky. Anthony Grosser pretty much knew everybody would know with him. So he's like, look, they already got embarrassed, and the state's embarrassed. He's using the infrastructure for his benefit once again. Let them take care of this. You clean up this stuff, get some garbage, been on this. So the stupid criminals get caught, the unlucky ones get caught, and in this case, it was both.

Oh and before we go, Elizabeth and I wanted to send out a special message to one of our listeners, Owen Colms. Your mom, Laura rode into the show and she told us you're having a rough go of it. We're sorry to hear that. On She also told us that you have a YouTube channel called the History Kid. We'd love to hear that. She says that you recreate historic battles. That sounds so cool. We're looking forward to checking out your channel. She also told us that July

is your birthday. Well, we wanted to issue a very special Happy twelfth Birthday from your friends. A Ridiculous Crime. Thanks for joining us. I'm Elizabeth Dutton over there, this is Aaron Burnett. Hey, have it bad? It's me s Thennett. Let's give you a quote. You can find us online a Ridiculous Crime on both Twitter and Instagram. Gotta tip for us about a ridiculous crime you'd like to hear about. You want to confess to a ridiculous crime? You want

to tell us about your family? Don't ridiculous crimes? Yeah, snitch on them. Email It's a ridiculous crime at gmail dot com. Ridiculous Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Zaron Burnett, produced and edited by the head of the Rhode Island State Lottery, commissioned Dave Couston. Researches by this week's Super Mega Millions winner, Marisa Brown. The theme song is by Miraculous Brothers lookalikes Thomas Lee and Travis Dutton.

Executive producers are Ben Can I get five on? Seven? Seven? Seven? Bold? And No? Did I just win? Oh? No, wait, that's a two Brown? Quiet say it one more time? We Dequeous Crew. Ridiculous Crime is a production of i heart Radio four more podcasts to my heart radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.