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Unclaimed Winning $1M Maryland Lottery Ticket Mystery Solved Months Later

Maryland Lottery officials have cracked the curious case of an unclaimed $1 million Powerball prize that wasn't collected for months because the player forgot she purchased it. 

The woman didn't realize for months that she was sitting on a million-dollar Powerball ticket.

The woman didn't realize for months that she was sitting on a million-dollar Powerball ticket.

Photo Credit: Unsplash/kenziem

A Worcester County woman is among the state's newest millionaires, but not before she sat on a ticket worth seven figures that hadn't been touched since the Sept. 27 drawing last year.

According to the Eastern Shore woman, she purchased the quick-pick ticket at the Duck In II in Snow Hill, hoping to take a stab at the then $835 million Powerball jackpot, but forgot all about it until recently.

She was one of four second-tier prize winners for the September drawing, but her cash remained unclaimed until last week, when she discovered the $10 ticket in her wallet and sent her husband out to scan it to see if there was even a small win. 

There was not a small win. It was a big win.

"I just wanted to check to see if we got anything," the warehouse worker mused, while her husband added simply, "There were a lot of zeros. I thought it was some type of promotional message. 

"I scanned it again and got the same numbers." 

Still not convinced that he was holding a ticket worth a million dollars, he handed it to a store clerk, who excitedly confirmed that, in fact, the Maryland woman had won the money.

“He likes to kid around and I thought he was joking,” the winner said.

Now, she plans to spend her unexpected and frogotten windfall to pay off the family's mortgage, while donating some to an area animal rescue.

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