it isn't fair.... it isn't fair, I tell ya.   

seriously, though, someone is going to very mad when that ticket pops up.

If it was like most unclaimed tickets of that amount then there were plenty of people making claims that couldn't be verified.

can they still claim the money after the deadline?

I am quite sure that there has never been a case where someone has been able to collect a lottery prize after the ticket expired.  There was one man in New York who actually mailed a winning ticket and it was processed a day or 2 later, but the envelope was postmarked before the expiration date.  I only know about this story because someone (think it was Todd) sent me a link when I remarked once "who would be stupid enough to drop a multi-million $$ claim with the winning ticket in the mail?" 

I have a FL Lotto quick pick with 4 of the numbers, but I guess that doesn't count in New Jersey. 

This is a good question, however.  Does anyone here know of any case where a winner came forward after his ticket expired?  I remember the story about the couple in CO that arrived at the store just before midnight to validate their ticket, but I don't recall hearing any stories about someone who actually found a missing ticket too late, maybe because that poor sucker jumped off a bridge.

No, not unless the person can convince the state to change the rules just for them.  That use to happen more in the past than it does these days because of the numbers of false claims.

There was a case I read on here a while back of people claiming scratch-offs after 1 year after the scratch-off game ended because they were misled by not being told when the game actually expired. Something along those lines, I think in Indiana or somewhere.

"When the ticket pops up" may be tough to happen considering it's under a pile of diapers in the Kearny dump and a rat is right now nibbling on the "O" in Lotto. Being that I don't go to Newark I was not there when the person dropped it and it landed face down and eventually swept up and dumped into the wastebasket on top of a pile of discarded scratch-offs where someone forgot to scratch the extra "E" in "MYSELF" thus missing getting their $3 back. Had instead this ticket been the one at Stop&Shop that I picked up, the winner (or the clerk I gave it back to) would have been thanking me.

The place where the store is, is not like it's along McCarter Hwy. where it's possible someone I know may have been holding it. This place is way back ironically (I think) near Seton Hall that in 2005 the Lerners gave a donation to when they won.

I think some people buy lotto tickets out of habit, but since they assume they won't win, they just don't check them. But I'm sure there are other possibilities as well. It could have gotten thrown out by accident, the person could have been elderly and passed, or, maybe the dog ate it :-) Either way, if they person is still around, I hope they never realize it was them....ignorance is bliss in this case!

Unbelieveable LOL! How do you lose or misplace that ticket? I could understand if you misplace a pick 3 or 4 but a 19 Million dollar Jackpot is just insane. I guess there is a lesson to be learned from this and that is if you play a Jackpot game and you checked the ticket and you think you've lost...Triple check it...then have your significant other double check it then after that let the freakin dog check it....LOL there is no way im losing out on 19 mil you can bet the family farm on that!

"How do you lose or misplace that ticket?"

The same way you lose any other ticket that only cost $1. The only thing that's reasonably certain about what happened to the ticket is that it was either lost (or forgotten) before the owner knew it won a jackpot,  or something very significant happened that  resulted in the owner being unable to  submit it.  With very few exceptions, people don't lose something after finding out that it's worth millions of dollars.

If the owner knew they lost the ticket it's a pretty safe bet that they would have attempted to claim the prize, anyway. If that were the case and the ticket turned up after the deadline passed there's a possibility that the lottery commission (or a court) would decide that  the owner had filed a claim before the deadline passed and was therefore entitled to the prize, but I'd guess that's already covered in the official rules.

With the number of unclaimed bi prizes sprouting up, it does make you wonder whether a winning ticket was actually sold.  How can that be proven?

wow that is a big conspiracy theory i never thought of i really hope that is not true because i really love playing the lottery and i have alot of faith that i will win oneday it really keeps me going most times when i want to give up and stop completely from doing anything anymore. im sure they have people check the computers to make sure a winner was sold and when and where...i will try to stay positive and keep the faith for now...

It doesn't seem right that the state keeps unclaimed prizes, it should go right into a special prize pool to be awarded at the next opportunity.  Keeping the prizes when your job is to award prizes would only fuel conspiracy that there really aren't winners.  In Willy Wonka there were five Golden Tickets out there and five people showed up.  Not four, with Willy keeping the last ticket to himself.  That guy knew how to run a contest.  Is Gene Wilder still alive?

All I know is I haven't been to Newark in general in 6 years and that section of Newark I've passed through years ago but not visiting any stores. I managed to finally find it on Google Earth. They didn't start talking about it until it was too close to the dealine. I'll never forget the day recently that there was a dropped Mega ticket, face-down, for the upcoming drawing, that would probably have become lost otherwise. That one didn't win but what if it had and what if I didn't see it?

Also I don't think with deceased people their heirs a year later are still so i mourning they don't check tickets left behind.