James S. Miller gave his girlfriend more than half his $3,200 prize before prosecutors say another $800 became the focus of a deadly dispute.
PORTLAND, Ore. — A $3,200 lottery win that James S. Miller partly shared with his girlfriend became the backdrop to a fatal confrontation months later described in court records, with prosecutors accusing Mary Ann McKinzy of intentionally running over the 75-year-old man after he went to recover money he said she had taken.
The money is not the only issue in the case, but it explains why Miller and McKinzy were in the same Portland apartment parking lot in the early hours of Nov. 28, 2025, according to reporting on a probable cause affidavit. Miller had given McKinzy $1,700 from his prize. Prosecutors allege she then took another $800 without permission. After that, records say, Miller began looking for McKinzy and enlisted others to help him get the money back. What began as a financial dispute ultimately became a homicide investigation built around a car, a knife, surveillance footage and sharply different implications about who posed an immediate threat.
Miller did not go to the apartment complex alone. A friend drove him there and later told investigators he did not know what Miller planned to do, according to published accounts of the affidavit. When they found McKinzy sitting in her car, Miller approached the driver’s side. The friend said he heard Miller insist that she open the door and threaten to break a window. That alleged threat would later sit alongside another crucial statement in the case: McKinzy’s claim, moments after Miller was struck, that he had been trying to kill her.
Before the fatal collision, the encounter became more restrictive and more volatile, investigators allege. Miller told his friend to use the other car to block McKinzy from leaving, according to the reported court record. McKinzy allegedly responded by backing into that vehicle. The friend got out to look at the damage and said he saw Miller throw a knife at McKinzy’s car. Surveillance footage described by prosecutors also allegedly shows Miller stabbing the car’s tires. The reported evidence therefore places aggressive acts by Miller immediately before the state says McKinzy used her own vehicle against him.
The prosecution’s allegation is that McKinzy then reversed and struck Miller, backing over him. When Miller’s friend shouted for her to move the car, McKinzy allegedly said Miller was “trying to kill me.” She then drove away, according to the affidavit as summarized by news organizations. Prosecutors contend the impact was intentional. Public reporting reviewed for this story does not contain a full response from McKinzy’s defense to the murder accusation, and no court ruling located for this article has determined whether her assertion of danger amounts to a legally valid defense.
Police arrived after receiving a report that someone had been stabbed, but that first description of Miller’s death proved incomplete. Miller was pronounced dead at the scene. The Multnomah County Medical Examiner later determined that he died from blunt force trauma and ruled the death a homicide, Portland police said. The finding made the vehicle, rather than a stab wound, central to the death investigation even as the knife remained part of the sequence investigators were trying to reconstruct.
The car itself became a major source of evidence. Published accounts of the probable cause affidavit say investigators found McKinzy’s vehicle at a tire shop later that day. A hubcap recovered from the scene matched the car, and another matching hubcap was reportedly found inside. Investigators also found damage to the hood that was described as consistent with Miller’s knife. Personal documents or belongings linked to McKinzy were reportedly left in the vehicle. Those details helped detectives connect the car to the parking-lot confrontation while they continued trying to locate its owner.
By the time investigators had an arrest warrant, McKinzy was no longer available to Portland police. Reports say she had already left Oregon or did so soon after the warrant was obtained. That absence turned a local homicide investigation into a multistate search. Portland police later said the U.S. Marshals Service found McKinzy in Bakersfield, California, on Aug. 5, 2026, more than eight months after Miller died. She was placed in the Kern County Jail pending extradition.
McKinzy was transported back to Oregon on Sept. 18 and booked into the Multnomah County Detention Center, according to the Portland Police Bureau. Police listed three charges: second-degree murder, first-degree assault and negligent homicide. The charges are accusations, not findings of guilt. The official police release did not set out the detailed financial dispute or the sequence involving the knife; those details emerged through news reports describing the probable cause affidavit filed in the case.
The lottery figures have drawn attention because they are unusually specific, but they should not obscure what prosecutors must establish. The state is not simply alleging that a disagreement over $800 ended badly. Prosecutors are accusing McKinzy of an intentional act that caused Miller’s death. At the same time, the reported affidavit includes evidence that Miller threatened property damage, helped block McKinzy’s path and attacked her tires with a knife. Those facts may shape how lawyers argue intent, fear and justification, but the sources reviewed for this article do not show that a judge or jury has resolved those issues.
There are also limits to what is publicly known about the lottery win itself. Reports based on the court record identify the prize as $3,200 and say Miller gave McKinzy $1,700. They do not identify the game, the place of purchase or when the ticket was bought. Nor do the sources reviewed here independently establish how prosecutors will prove the allegation that McKinzy took the additional $800. In a criminal case, that disputed money may help explain motive or context, but the homicide charges will turn on evidence about the fatal encounter and McKinzy’s state of mind.
The path from the prize to the arrest stretched across many months. Miller died Nov. 28, 2025. Police identified McKinzy as a suspect during the homicide investigation. U.S. Marshals arrested her Aug. 5, 2026, in California. She was returned to Multnomah County on Sept. 18. That timeline is one reason the case became newly public in September even though the death itself occurred the previous year. The official Portland police announcement focused on the capture and extradition, while subsequent reporting supplied the alleged money dispute and the parking-lot details.
Law&Crime reported that McKinzy was scheduled to appear in court Sept. 29. No later reliable public account located for this article as of Nov. 8 established what happened at that appearance or identified a trial date. The absence of a reported next milestone leaves the case at a procedural point where the central accusations are public but unresolved. Police have continued to seek information from anyone who has not already spoken with investigators, using case No. 25-325754.
The known record therefore tells two stories at once: one about a modest lottery prize and a dispute over how much of it belonged to whom, and another about the much more serious legal question of what happened when Miller confronted McKinzy in the parking lot. Prosecutors say McKinzy deliberately used her car to kill him. The reported evidence also shows Miller acting aggressively moments earlier. Until those facts are tested in court, the financial argument explains the confrontation’s origin but does not answer the criminal case.
Author note: Last updated November 8, 2026.