LAVRICK WILLOCKS HAS BEEN SENTENCED TO SIX YEARS IN PRISON.

NORTH DAKOTA, United States, Tuesday October 16, 2018 – A Jamaican man who authorities say masterminded a lottery scam that defrauded at least 95 Americans from at least five states out of more than US$5.8 million, was yesterday sentenced to six years in federal prison.

But 29-year-old Lavrick Willocks, who will be eligible for parole after serving about three years, was adamant that he was being portrayed as something he was not.

“The government tries to portray me as a mastermind or kingpin, or words to exaggerate the role I played here,” he told US District Judge Daniel Hovland at his sentencing.

Although Willocks apologized for his role in the crime, he insisted that he was not the big player prosecutors claimed.

“If I hadn’t been involved, it wouldn’t have stopped anything,” he said.

Willocks pleaded guilty in July last year to conspiracy, and prosecutors dropped 65 other counts of wire fraud, mail fraud and money laundering, and faced up to 40 years in prison. However, a six-year term was recommended by Assistant US Attorney Jonathan O’Konek who said Willocks cooperated and his plea deal prompted several other defendants to also come clean.

Although crediting Willocks for cooperating, Judge Hovland described him as a “ringleader”. In addition to imposing the jail time, he ordered Willocks to pay US$1.5 million in restitution. Earlier this year, the judge had ordered that cash and jewelry seized from the Jamaican when he was arrested in his homeland in November 2016 be liquidated and the proceeds paid to victims.

Willocks was among 27 people charged in connection with the lottery scam that prosecutors said he operated out of a mansion in Jamaica where he lived with his mother, Dahlia Hunter, who was also charged.

All the accused have pleaded guilty or been convicted, and most have been sentenced.