Hudsonhubtimes.com - Woman pleads guilty in rigged school raffle case

by Jeff Saunders

Reporter

Northfield Center -- A Beechwood Drive woman pleaded guilty in Cuyahoga Falls Municipal Court April 9 to a first-degree misdemeanor charge of cheating in connection with a rigged school raffle in January.

According to court records, April L. Nelli, 31, pleaded guilty to the charge after it was reduced from a fifth-degree felony cheating charge. Nelli was given a 180-day suspended sentence and fined $1,000, $650 of which was suspended. She paid $250 on April 9 and is scheduled to pay the remaining $100 plus $1,119 in court costs by Aug. 8.

A phone number for Nelli could not be located. Her attorney, Charles Swanson, did not return calls seeking comment.

According to the Summit County Sheriff's Office, the charge stemmed from a Jan. 25 Northfield Elementary Parent Teacher Association reverse raffle where fellow PTA members became suspicious after Nelli won six gift baskets, valued at a total of $2,450.

The sheriff's office said Nelli rigged the raffles by purchasing tickets that were identical in color, but had different numbers to the legitimate tickets, at a party store. She then signed them with her name and her daughter's name and was able to include them with the real ones without anyone seeing her, the sheriff's office said.

Nelli returned to the school that night after she was contacted by a sheriff's deputy and returned the prize baskets. However, it took a detective weeks to sort out the legitimate tickets from Nelli's 1,943 tickets, and she was not charged until March 13.

E-mail: jsaunders@recordpub.com

Phone: 330-688-0088 ext. 3169