A pastor is reportedly the subject of a county attorney general's investigation stemming from a church raffle that offered a new C8-generation Chevrolet Corvette Stingray as the grand prize. According to a report from the Erie Times-News, the pastor fabricated the name of the raffle winner, as well as the winners of several other smaller prizes.
Back in 2024, St. Jude the Apostle Church in Erie, Pennsylvania held a raffle to raise funds for its parish. Tickets were $50 each, and up to 9999 were to be sold in the hope of raising nearly $500,000. And grand prize in this raffle was no ordinary fruit basket: the winner could choose either $50,000 in cash or a Amplify Orange 2024 Chevy Corvette Convertible 1LT. (You would have no excuse for being late to mass with that prize.)
The raffle also included “12 days of Christmas,” other drawings in which raffle winners could win $500 a day leading up to Christmas Eve drawing for the Corvette. St. Jude said ticket holders were assigned random numbers via computer, according to the Erie Times-News, and the four-digit number on the winning ticket had to match the winning number in that evening's Pick 4 Pennsylvania Lottery drawing.
The number drawn that night was 5851, and according to the pastor of St. Jude, the Rev. Ross R. Miceli, Martin Anderson of Detroit was the big winner. On Christmas Day, Anderson was named the winner in a post on the charity car raffle Facebook page, and he reportedly decided to go with the $50,000 cash prize in lieu of the 'Vette. Problem was, he never bought a ticket; Miceli has been accused of making the name up.
The Erie County District Attorney's Office is investigating Miceli on allegations that the 42-year-old rigged the Corvette raffle, tampered with its records and committed theft. According to the Erie Times-News, Miceli “admitted to publicly falsifying the results of the grand prize winner” during the investigation.
Miceli allegedly also made up some of the winners for the $500 prizes, according to affidavits for some of the search warrants. In an interview with detectives, Miceli reportedly admitted to making up the names of four of the $500 winners where no name was associated with the winning number — so, he personally chose the winners, who were allegedly either family friends or his favorite parishioners.
As for the $50,000 grand prize, Miceli admitted to moving the money from the car raffle account to another account, according to the Erie Times-News; he claims this other account is an interest-bearing account that is under the church’s name.
Miceli is leaving the St. Jude the Apostle Church as the investigation continues. He will reportedly be heading to two smaller churches in Clearfield County, Pennsylvania.
You Might Also Like
Comments