California woman may have washed $26m lottery fortune down the drain
The winner of a $26m California lottery prize may have literally washed the chance of a fortune down the drain.
The winning SuperLotto Plus ticket for the 14 November drawing was sold at an Arco AM/PM convenience store in the Los Angeles suburb of Norwalk. Thursday was the last day to redeem it. Nobody did.
Store employee Esperanza Hernandez told the Whittier Daily News that a woman came in on Wednesday and told workers that she had put the ticket in her pants and it was destroyed in the laundry.
The store’s manager told KTLATV that surveillance video showed the woman who bought the ticket, and she is known to store workers.
A copy of the surveillance video was turned over to California lottery officials, the manager said.
The claim will be investigated, a lottery spokeswoman, Cathy Johnston, said.
Lottery officials say someone who believes he or she is a winner must complete a claim form. But if someone loses a ticket, they must provide evidence that they owned it, such as a photograph of the front and back of the ticket, the officials said.
The winning numbers were: 23, 36, 12, 31, 13, with the mega number of 10. The $26m prize can be taken in annual installments or as a $19.7m cash option.
If the prize isn’t claimed, the $19.7m will go to California public schools.
The store that sold the ticket will receive a $130,000 bonus.
It’s uncommon for large jackpots to go unclaimed, officials said.
Four prizes of $20m or more haven’t been claimed since 1997, including a $63m prize from 2015, a lottery spokesman, Jorge De La Cruz, told the Los Angeles Times.