A $2 billion mystery: Was Edwin Castro the real Powerball winner?

As almost all lottery fans know, Edwin Castro won the single biggest lottery jackpot in history. He held the winning ticket for the $2.04 billion Powerball drawing held on November 8, 2022, which he purchased at Joe's Service Center in Altadena, CA, his hometown.

While he's kept a low profile since his stunning win, Castro is known as an active real estate investor and car enthusiast. He is the publicly listed owner of several trophy properties located in the Los Angeles area, including a $25 million Hollywood Hills party mansion.

But what if none of that is accurate and Edwin Castro isn't the real winner of that massive Powerball prize at all? What if the real winner is a man named Jose Rivera, a landscaper who lived near Castro and had the massive prize ripped from his own unsuspecting hands?

While the courts have ruled repeatedly in Castro's favor, others, including lottery lawyer Kurt Panouses, believe that Rivera is the rightful winner of the November 8, 2022, Powerball drawing.

The lottery lawyer

Kurt Panouses is a Florida-based attorney and former accountant who specializes in representing lottery winners. He helps them navigate the complexities of the claiming process, preserves their anonymity when possible, and guides them financially as they invest and spend their riches.

Rivera's legal team hired Panouses to help represent their client in his claims against Castro, and, given the time he spent on the case, he believes Rivera is the rightful owner of the ticket.

Panouses told Lottery USA the following in an exclusive interview:

I was actually on the team helping the guy who I still to this day believe actually bought the ticket. And the problem was he was a loose cannon. He was so angry that he was a bad client, unfortunately, and I felt sorry for him.

The real winner?

In Rivera's telling of the story, he was the one who purchased the ticket from Joe's Service Station, but it was stolen from him by a man named Urachi “Reggie” Romero, a friend he was living with at the time.

Panouses shared the story as he understood it:

Well, the story that I was given, and it's a believable story, so this Jose Rivera was kind of down on his luck. He had just gotten divorced. He was living out of his truck. He was a landscaper, and he was doing a job for a guy, and he was telling the guy he was living out of his truck, and the guy said, Well, hey, if you want, my wife and I have a room, we could rent you the room in the back till you get on your feet. So he said, Well, that would be great.

Panouses continued:

So he rented the room in the back of the house, and of course, the day came when it was a $2 billion ticket. And the guy (Reggie) reminded him, Hey, make sure you get a lot of tickets today. So he (Rivera) stopped in the morning. It was a morning, the day before the ticket was drawn, and it was raining.

The video

The California Lottery is aware of Rivera's claims and has investigated Castro thoroughly to determine whether he was the rightful winner. One of their primary pieces of evidence was a video showing Castro purchasing the winning ticket at the time sales records indicate it was sold.

However, Panouses claims that the evidence is not actually reliable because the cameras did not perfectly sync with the time.

So he (Riviera) stopped early in the morning before he started doing landscaping work. And he went into Joe's Service Station, and he's on the store video, which also shows Edwin Castro supposedly in the store. And the video system was old, so it wasn't exactly on time. So when they (California Lottery) said, 'we think someone was here at 9:00 AM', it may not have been 9:00 AM.

Joe Chayahed, the owner of Joe's Service Station, claims he also remembers Rivera buying a lottery ticket. Mr Chayahed told reporters:

I knew the guy before he won; he came every morning to buy coffee, donuts, and tickets ... then he disappeared. I thought he was mad at me or something had happened, but then someone told me he won the money.

The alleged theft

The logical question is: if Rivera bought the winning ticket, how did it end up in Castro's hands?

Panouses explains:

Rivera supposedly bought his ticket, came home that night, and Reggie talked to him and said, Hey, did you get your ticket? He goes, 'Yes,' so they chatted for a little bit, had pizza, and he left his tickets on the couch or table. The next morning, he woke up to go to work, and of course, there was a delay that day in the drawing. So it didn't get drawn that night. It was drawn the next day.

The delay in the nightly Powerball drawing was due to reporting issues in Minnesota. According to Panouses, Rivera was at work when the numbers were finally selected, and his ticket was somewhere in Reggie's house. When Reggie saw that Rivera had the winning ticket, he picked it up and started telling people that he was the winner.

Now, here is where the story takes another interesting twist, allegedly involving Castro, according to Panouses:

And somehow it got into Mr. Castro's father's hands, we were told, by less desirable means of some sort, I guess, is a good way of kind of saying it. I don't know. I've never met the guy, but allegedly, he gave it to his son (Castro). Supposedly, the son was in the store. That's the story. And he claimed it. And all of a sudden, this landlord ended up with some bags of money that he was supposedly showing off in the neighborhood.

Further complicating the story, while Reggie denied taking the ticket from Rivera, he claims he saw his former friend holding the winning ticket and even explained the meaning behind each number he chose.

He told reporters:

I asked him why he picked two 10s. He said it was the date his parents both died. He picked 47 because that's how old he is. He also said his dad always wanted a 1956 Chevy truck, so he picked 56. He had a reason why he chose every number, and he told me this before (the drawing).

The trial

Rivera would go on to file a lawsuit against Castro and the California Lottery, claiming that because he was the rightful winner, he should be entitled to the entire jackpot.

The trial did not go well for Rivera, whom Panouse described as a terrible client with a bad temper. Rivera argued with and fired his attorney during a pretrial hearing. The judge suspended the case and threatened to have Rivera brought into a mental health court.

The outburst caused a delay in the trial and stretched Rivera's limited resources to pay for his attorneys.

Ultimately, the judge ruled against Rivera and affirmed that Castro was the rightful winner. In part of his ruling, he stated that it may not have even mattered if Rivera did buy the original ticket because:

Players are solely responsible for securing their tickets against theft, loss, damage, or destruction.

Rivera did not appeal the ruling, and the case is now considered closed.

The rightful winner

For its part, the California Lottery stands by its vetting and verification process.

In a publicly released statement, California Lottery spokesperson Carolyn Becker stated:

Further, when it comes to the vetting process for big winners, California Lottery has the utmost confidence in its process for doing so. California Lottery remains confident that Edwin Castro is the rightful winner of the $2.04 billion prize stemming from the Powerball drawing in November of 2022.

Becker added:

Even when someone comes forward, the California Lottery doesn't publicly announce or acknowledge it until that claimant is thoroughly reviewed and vetted by our security and law enforcement division.

As part of the winner verification process, lottery investigators will ask questions that only the winner should know the answer to, such as the date and time the ticket was purchased, whether it was a quick pick or player-selected numbers, and the total number of tickets the player bought for the drawing.

Lottery officials added that they take additional steps to validate winners, which they keep confidential, so scammers cannot prepare for them.

Castro

If the fallout from the trial bothered Castro, he hasn't shown it. He continues to live the life of the wealthy, with paparazzi snapping pictures of him on dates at LA hotspots such as Sushi Park.

He did experience some hardship when his Malibu home burned down in the devastating 2024 LA fires, but he owns several other personal properties.

Lately, it looks like he has been more civic-minded with his spending. He's purchased several properties in the fire-ravaged neighborhoods in his hometown of Alta Dena with the intention of helping the community rebuild.

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, he claims to have spent at least $10 million to purchase 15 fire-damaged homes in the city. Castro told reporters while showing them one of his new properties:

This is for a family that wants to move in. Those are the people that need to be looked out for right now.

Nothing has been heard from Rivera since his case was dismissed.