People buy lottery tickets all the time and forget about them. They tuck them away in the glove box in the car, crumple them up in pockets and sometimes just throw them away. A recent $1 million winner is familiar with that scenario.

Jerry from Springfield found his forgotten ticket in his wallet, just days before it was set to expire. He was traveling a lot as his brother battled cancer. On one of their trips for treatment, he bought a Powerball ticket at a gas station along the highway. He tucked it in his wallet and forgot about it. That was in October.
Last month, Jerry was getting ready for a doctor appointment of his own. He was looking for his doctor’s card in his wallet, and when he pulled it out the rolled-up nearly six months old Powerball ticket came out with it. He went to the website to check his ticket and discovered five matching numbers.
“I thought, this is not a joke! So, I asked my wife to check the numbers too,” he said.
She checked, and he had in fact matched five numbers in the October 16, 2019 drawing. But his biggest surprise came when he double checked the prize amount.
“I think it’s $100,000. I went to the website and looked at prizes and low and behold it’s a million dollars!” he said.
Jerry couldn’t wait to claim the prize, especially since it was days away from expiring. But he found the ticket as Ohioans were told to stay home in the battle against the Coronavirus and Ohio Lottery offices were closed. Jerry was urged to mail in his claim. He said he was nervous to mail such a big winning ticket, but he talked to lottery staffers and kept in touch throughout the claims process.
Now he can celebrate, and more importantly, share his win with the people he loves most.
“I’m going to share this win with my family. I want to put some money away for my kids and help my family in other ways,” Jerry said.
We're glad he found it!
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