"A 25-year-old convenience store clerk pocketed a customer's $1 million winning lottery ticket, claimed the prize and skipped town, possibly back to his native Nepal, authorities said.
Pankaj Joshi took 67-year-old Willis Willis' winning Mega Millions megaplier ticket after Willis asked Joshi in May to check whether any of his numbers were winners, investigators said in a search warrant affidavit last month.
Joshi claimed the prize - about $750,000 after taxes - at the lottery claim center in Austin, had the money wired to a bank account and disappeared, authorities said.
'Never to this degree have we seen a clerk steal a megaplier winning ticket,' assistant district attorney Patty Robertson said Wednesday."