NAMES IN THE NEWS : Hoaxer Brags of Fooling Media With ‘Winner’ of Lotto Jackpot

A professional hoaxer, protesting the state lottery as a joke, bragged today that he had bamboozled television, radio and newspaper reporters by hiring an actress to claim she was the winner of a $35-million Lotto jackpot.

“The lottery is a joke, basically because you don’t have a chance to win,” hoaxer Alan Abel said in a rambling interview on WWOR-TV.

“The poor suckers out there are taking their baby and bread money to buy those tickets,” said Abel, who teaches an adult education course on practical joking.

Smiling smugly, Abel said he hired a New York actress and comedienne to throw a lavish party at a hotel where she claimed that she held the winning ticket drawn Saturday night that entitled her to the $35-million New York State Lotto 54 jackpot. The woman said she got the numbers from Donald Trump and Malcolm Forbes in a dream.

Officials early Sunday announced that the winning ticket had been sold in Westchester County, but said no winner had come forward.

The $35-million jackpot is the third largest in the New York lottery, and the payout to the owner or owners of the winning ticket will be a new record for an individual ticket-winner, said New York State Lottery spokesman Bill Knowlton.

The actress identified herself as Charlene Taylor, 30, and said she is a cosmetologist from Dobbs Ferry, N.Y. She threw a party Sunday night at the Omni Park Central Hotel in New York, faxing out invitations to the news media.

The Daily News trumpeted the hoax on the front page of its late editions, saying one of its reporter spotted Abel in the hotel suite where the party was held and recognized him from his practical joke class.