Massachusetts man sentenced for embezzling from RI Lottery

By The Associated Press

news@abc6.com

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) _ A Massachusetts man will serve time for embezzling more than $5,000 from the Rhode Island Lottery.

Forty-seven-year-old Paul Mahfouz of Raynham, Massachusetts, was ordered Monday to serve six months of a five-year sentence behind bars. He must also pay $36,064.20 in restitution.           

Mahfouz was found guilty in April by a Providence County Superior Court jury of embezzlement and of unlawful appropriation in an unrelated incident.              

Prosecutors say Mahfouz embezzled $5,064.20 from the Rhode Island Lottery when he took funds that he held in trust for the lottery as a retail agent and used them for himself.

Mahfouz owned a Shell gas station in Providence.

Prosecutors say Mahfouz also took $31,000 from Elie Antoun to sell him a state motor vehicle inspection machine, but Mahfouz never delivered the machine to him.

© The Associated Press / WLNE-TV 2015