Lottery ticket leads FBI to Illinois bank robbery suspect

PALATINE, Ill. – Authorities say a dropped lottery ticket led investigators to the man who robbed a suburban Chicago bank.

Court documents say an FBI agent found an Illinois lottery scratch-off ticket that surveillance video showed falling from the man’s pocket during the Sept. 28 robbery of a Chase Bank branch in Palatine.

Agents tracked the ticket to where it was sold at a gas station in the nearby community of Rolling Meadows. They used store video to match the buyer as the man who redeemed some winning tickets at another gas station and identify his car. Local police stopped the car Tuesday night in Arlington Heights.

Federal prosecutors charged 38-year-old Dexter Riley with robbing about $8,200 from the bank. Court records on Friday didn’t list a defence attorney for Riley.