Arkansas – A years-long theft scheme at a small Arkansas business has ended with a decade-long prison sentence after investigators determined that nearly a quarter of a million dollars in lottery tickets were stolen by an employee trusted to handle daily operations.
Billie Rainwater, 47, was sentenced to 120 months in the Arkansas Department of Corrections, followed by 120 months of suspended imposition of sentence, also known as supervised probation. The sentence came after Rainwater accepted a negotiated plea deal tied to the theft of almost $250,000 worth of lottery tickets from her workplace over several years.
Investigation uncovered a steady pattern of theft
The case began in October 2024, when Rachel Rice, the owner of Mill Creek Liquor on U.S. Highway 62 West in Pocahontas, contacted local authorities after noticing lottery ticket rolls disappearing from a secured cabinet inside her store. According to an arrest affidavit, Rice had first grown suspicious about a month earlier and alerted the Arkansas Lottery Commission after realizing the losses were not random.
Rice said she spent weeks carefully reviewing paperwork, sales records, and lottery activation logs. After what she described as “combing through” the documents, she calculated that approximately $249,800 worth of lottery tickets had gone missing from the retailer dating back to 2022.
As Rice compared the activation dates of the missing ticket rolls with employee schedules, a clear and troubling pattern emerged. Rainwater, who worked at the store during that period, was the on-duty employee every single time a stolen roll was activated.
Rice told investigators that each roll of lottery tickets cost the store $600, and that roughly four rolls per week were disappearing. She also expressed concern that the total loss could be even higher, explaining that her available records only went back to 2022 and that thefts may have started as early as 2021, when the store first began selling lottery tickets.
Confession and arrest followed employee interview
The Randolph County Sheriff’s Office brought Rainwater in for an interview as part of the investigation. During that interview, Rainwater admitted to stealing lottery tickets but offered a shorter timeline than what store records suggested.
Captain Terry Green documented Rainwater’s statement in his report, writing that she confessed to stealing “around two rolls of tickets each week for the last year.” However, investigators noted a clear conflict between her claim and the financial records gathered by the store owner.
“I told Billie that the store owner, Rachel Rice, had documents showing that rolls of tickets had been going missing since 2022, and Billie stated that she hadn’t been stealing them for that long,” Green recounted in the arrest affidavit.
Rainwater was arrested in February 2025 and formally charged with theft of property valued at or over $25,000, a felony offense under Arkansas law.
Restitution ordered along with prison sentence
In addition to her prison term and probation, Rainwater was ordered to pay $250,000 in restitution. Court records show she must make monthly payments of $2,085, beginning 90 days after her release from jail, until the amount is fully repaid.
Authorities said the sentence reflects both the financial harm caused to the business and the length of time over which the theft occurred. Investigators emphasized that the case highlights how careful record-keeping and persistence by a business owner ultimately exposed a steady pattern of internal theft that spanned years.
