The head of the Arkansas Scholarship Lottery on Monday vowed there won't be a repeat of a theft scheme like the one a former security official for the agency last week admitted perpetrating.
Lottery Director Bishop Woosley addressed the scandal involving former deputy security director Remmele Mazyck at the end of his regular report during the commission's meeting Monday.
"I want to give assurances to the commission and the public that this is not something that will happen again," Woosley said, noting that the system worked as it should to ultimately cause Mazyck's scheme to "come crashing down fairly quickly."
Mazyck, was fired in November after he failed to show up to a meeting set to discuss the allegations. On Friday, he admitted in federal court that he cashed $477,893 from thousands of winning, stolen tickets, exploiting a computer security system he could access to change the status of the pilfered tickets to "promotional."
Woosley said Monday that the lottery has moved to do away with promotional tickets, which were given away at events such as Riverfest to draw players to the lottery.
"I feel confident we've covered all our bases and we are a better agency for this having happened," he said.
The director spoke after a meeting that began with commissioners going into executive session for more than an hour to discuss employee discipline, but no action was ultimately taken.
Commissioners went into the closed session almost immediately after the 10 a.m. meeting began and didn't emerge until after 11:15 a.m.
At that point, chairman George Hammons announced no action was taken. Woosley said at a news conference after the plea Friday that lottery officials were reviewing internal procedures, noting there is "probably lots of fault to go around in the agency."
After the meeting Monday, he said he knew of no employees who would be disciplined because of any involvement in the case. But, he said, he would wait to review the federal case in full before ruling such action out.