Party Store Employee Charged In Lottery Ticket Theft Headed To Trial
February 26, 2020
An employee of a Fowlerville party store has been bound over for trial on a felony charge alleging he embezzled lottery tickets.
A hearing for 42-year-old Christopher Bandy was held Monday in 53rd District Court in Howell. Court records show a judge determined there was enough evidence to send the case to trial, and Bandy was bound over to Livingston County Circuit Court on count of embezzlement of $100,000 or more.
Fowlerville Police say the owner of Buddy's Mini Mart called them after noticing that approximately $120,000 in lottery sales was missing. The tickets were then tracked to the girlfriend of a store employee, now identified as Bandy, after they were cashed at Kroger stores in Brighton and Howell. Fowlerville Police Chief John Tyler testified that surveillance footage from the store shows Bandy coming into the store and deleting camera footage each time a pack of lottery tickets was believed to have been stolen.
Bandy, who has previous felony convictions of home invasion and car theft, was also on federal probation for a previous conviction of manufacturing and possessing a pipe bomb. Future court dates in the embezzlement case have not yet been set.