TRENTON, NJ — Two friends who claim they bought a Powerball ticket worth $1 million at a Mahwah convenience store last year sued the New Jersey Lottery Commission yesterday, claiming they tossed out the ticket because the state was too slow to update its website with the winning numbers.
Salvatore Cambria and Erik Onyango claim in a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Trenton that they picked five of six numbers drawn on March 23, 2013, the same day a Passaic deli owner scored the $338 million Powerball jackpot prize.
The Suffern, N.Y. friends say that even though they didn't pick the winning Powerball number the combination they chose entitled them to a $1 million consolation payout, the lawsuit says.
During a telephone conversation the night numbers were drawn, Onyango relayed the winning numbers to Cambria off the commission's website, the lawsuit claims.
"The operators of the website had not timely updated the current winning numbers," it adds.
Believing he'd lost, Cambria discarded the $1 million ticket, the lawsuit claims.
When the two men went to the commission earlier this year with their claim they were told they were out of luck, their attorney says.
"They were told that without the ticket they were not going to pay," said attorney Edward Logan.
Logan says the two men regularly bought lottery tickets for one another at the Mahwah 7-11.
On March 23, 2013, Onyango bought three tickets, keeping two for himself and turning over a third to Cambria.
The friends say they can prove the ticket that went to Cambria is the winning one because it was the middle ticket of three they purchased that day. Onyango kept the other two tickets, which include their serial numbers.
"The plaintiffs here may not have produced the winning ticket but have tendered two of the three tickets purchased in immediate succession and can prove that they in fact purchased and possessed the original ticket," Logan writes in the lawsuit.
Judith Drucker, a spokeswoman for the commission, declined to comment.
Also named as a defendant is the Multi-State Lottery Association and Gov. Chris Christie.
Pedro Quezada, a Dominican immigrant and the owner of the Apple Deli Grocery in Passaic won the March 2013 jackpot, the fourth largest in Powerball history.
Quezada took his lottery winnings in a lump sum of $221 million or $152 million after taxes.
"Imagine... so much money," Quezada said at a press conference held a few days after he'd won. "But it will not change my heart."
they're too frickin lazy to get the printed results and check their numbers, they carelessly toss a winning ticket and wants to cry foul....
these two should be posted on world's dumbest lottery players along with many others.
the state doesn't owe these two morons squat.
ok.....
maybe the state does owe them a swift kick in the butt.
LOL
i will be following this story though.
i remember this significantly huge jackpot
by Mr.Pedro Quesada think his name es.In any event,the plaintiff is suing,so i will await to see
obtuse or not on their end,i still want to see the adjudication on this lawsuit,pretty interesting.
adios!
Unfortunately no ticket, no money, this isn't Canada! lol kinda sucks!!
Did they consult with Mr. Shaske before filing this lawsuit?
No Lottery Commission is going to go ahead and honor this " missing ticket"- it would open up a flood gate of other silly complaints from lottery players.
If these guys tossed their ticket, how is that the Commissions fault?
That's like rear ending someone and complaining that the reason you did is because the person in front of you...Stopped!
I just clicked on the NJ lottery website winning numbers page. For each game it has the name of the game, then says "current winning numbers", with the day of the week, the date, and the number. Apparently they didn't bother to look at the day and date. If they still have the other two tickets, they should be able to prove they had it. However the fact that they don't, is pure stupidity on their part.
Another question is, even if the lottery agrees that it was their ticket, would the lottery cash it if it is past the redemption date?
Having the TWO tickets does not translate into having the "3rd" winning one.
Remember that scene in one of the Indiana Jones movies where he throws a German officer out of the Zeppelin for having " No Ticket! " No proof, no cash.l cannot see any court siding with these guys.
It may turn out the third one was cashed and the two losers were discarded by the real winner. It makes no sense to discard the winner and keep the losers.
A good Attorney would stay away from this case, unless these clowns promised him Half.
Not only would any attorney taking this case expect half of the winnings but also a non refundable large deposit just in case he lost.
Brilliant point. They just happened to keep the two losing tickets for over a year, but the ticket with the winning numbers is the one they threw away. Sure, that makes sense.
How stupid does a person have to be to not check the date of the numbers? How many times can people in this country bring lawsuits against others for their own stupidity. I pray to God that they are made to pay the fees for the defense once they lose.
How about this scenario RJOH : They Did purchase 3 tickets, they discard the winning one, someone picks that one out of the trash or wherever and cashes it.
Would these two have a case in telling the court that the ticket they threw away was found and cashed by this person?- the answer would be, " if you did not sign the back of the ticket, you lose!"
There is nothing in this story that tells us whether they signed the back of the ticket or not, in any event " they up a creek without a paddle"
The funny thing is I've almost done this at least once. You look at the website soon after the draw and because losing is so common, you quickly look at the results and see the ticket is a loser and toss it. But I'm never in a hurry to toss my tickets. I gotta recheck them a few days later
These NJ friends will not win the case especially because it's a game run by MUSL. Had it been a state game they might have had a small chance.
No ticket, no payout. What do people think? How can you collect on assumptions and no winning ticket to show?
People are crazy and will try anything. What does ticket order have to do with anything?
Nice try guys but if you did not check the winning tickets with another retailer or at a latter time and threw out the winning ticket, you lose.
Pedro Q who won the Powerball in March 2013 proves the streets here are sometimes paved with gold.
Yikes, they have the losing tickets?
Onyango owes Cambria a half million but Cambria doesn't deserve it, he should have checked the tix. himself.
Jersey can tell these guys to go jam it !
It's true that Jersey can be slow to update their site, everyone that uses the site knows that,
but the dates are there and plain to see.
In any case I hope the c-store gets their prize for selling the winner, don't try and weasel outta that JERSEY !
They must be suffering in Suffern!
I find it funny that they only tossed one ticket not all three and it just happens to be the "winning ticket".
Hey you never know though, they might win their case. lol
But let's say hypothetically they do win. How much money are they going to get after attorney fees, taxes and splitting the win amongst the both of them? Probably not a lot. So this should probably be a lesson to them to not toss their tickets in the garbage before they actually take the time to check them.
On March 23, 2013, Onyango bought three tickets, keeping two for himself and turning over a third to Cambria. The friends say they can prove the ticket that went to Cambria is the winning one because it was the middle ticket of three they purchased that day. Onyango kept the other two tickets, which include their serial numbers.
The story doesn't mention a 5 + 0 winning ticket that wasn't validated, but if there is one, the lottery knows exactly when and where it was bought. Without one, the two men are wasting their time, but if an unclaimed ticket was sold in the same store at the same time Onyango bought three tickets, they have the beginnings of a case.
No Ticket, No Money: Remember willis willis. I hold on to tickets,until the next day. To make sure if they are winners or not.
They still don't have the beginnings of a case because the clinchers are:
1. They didn't have the sense to check the date of the numbers on the website. Unless they can prove there's a law that the lottery websites are required to update the numbers within a certain timeframe they have no case. And as long as the date of the draw of the numbers posted is there, they can't blame anyone but themselves.
2. It's their responsibility to keep, and present, a signed ticket to the lottery commission. They weren't scammed. They weren't robbed at gunpoint. A fire didn't break out and incinerate the ticket. They opted to throw the ticket away.
3. They also had the option to double check the numbers directly on the MM website. They didn't.
Pretty soon you're going to have people suing for money on tickets they lost or allowed to expired if this is ever allowed to go forward.
This story is not found on the Jersey lottery website, wonder why ? LMAO
WOW you had a $1 million dollar ticket in your hand
You know this story is probably true my mom threw away a pb ticket last year and she won $1 million dollars on the ticket.
The lottery office can look at video and clearly see you on the video, however if you don't produce the ticket you don't get the money.
We tore up the house looking for the ticket but she knew she threw it away some people just don't check their tickets
These two guys from New York claim New Jersey had such a ticket that went unclaimed and they want NJ to prove they didn't. Since they are both from NY I wonder why they didn't check the NY website too since both states sell PB. Their problem isn't for NJ to prove no such ticket exits but to prove they brought it. Tickets go unclaimed all the time but states have no obligation to give the prize to any one with a good story.
They may have a beginnings of a case Stack- which l may add is going nowhere fast.
Unless there has been an incident in the past where a lottery Commission paid out a large sum of money " without a ticket"- these guys are chasing smoke. If they did win, it opens up a can of worms.
Well, if you count Willis Willis, they have paid out money without a ticket. But at least in that case there were extenuating circumstances.
It looks like we're talking about two different things because if the store where they bought their tickets never sold a ticket matching 5 numbers, there is no $ million dollar law suit. If a state lottery can determine where and when a jackpot winning ticket was sold, they also can determine where any 5 number match was sold.
I said they have the beginnings of a case if there is an unclaimed ticket matching five numbers and that doesn't necessarily means a "good case". Do you believe they are suing the N.J. Lottery for $1 million only because the website was slow?
"The plaintiffs here may not have produced the winning ticket but have tendered two of the three tickets purchased in immediate succession and can prove that they in fact purchased and possessed the original ticket," Logan writes in the lawsuit.
If there was no ticket sold matching five numbers without the bonus number, there is no case. If there was such a ticket sold and was in "immediate succession", it depends on N.J. law or if there are any precedents where a prize was award to a player without validating the ticket.
Recently a player who was swindled out of scratch-off jackpot was awarded the prize without the ticket.
https://www.lotterypost.com/news/74344?q=Store+clerk+accused+of+cheating
If and only if there was a ticket matching five numbers sold at the same store and if they made their claim of discarding the ticket before the expiration date, they may have the beginnings of case. But even if they can prove it was likely they bought the winning ticket, N.J. might have a "no ticket, no money" law.
Stack makes a good point. It's tempting to say that if you're dumb enough to toss your ticket because you weren't paying attention when you're checking it then you deserve to lose. However, as far as facts go, if the other two tickets that they do have were bought at the same time and place as the missing winner, that's enough evidence to say that it is plausible that they had the winner and they can at least start a case. They might not win, but it's enough to get the ball rolling.
It would be a lot easier if the store where the winning ticket was sold still had the surveillance video from the date and time the sale occurred. However, that's not likely.
It would also be a lot easier if they were obviously lying, like if there are no outstanding $1 million winners from NJ for that date. So far, though, that doesn't appear to be the case. If it was, the story would have been over long ago.
I don't buy the middle of the series claim. Someone could have bought that ticket then these two came back in and decided to buy one more ticket.
If I was the judge, I would be laughing in their faces LONG TIME!!!!
Mr. Cambria was the impatient one who discarded his ticket before waiting for the results of the draw. That's solely on him, cry me a river!!
There has been times here in Maryland where the Maryland Lottery website has been slow in updating, that doesn't mean that I say oh well I probably lost anyways so I destroy my tickets. Sounds like Mr. Cambria realized what a huge mistake he made yet wants the New Jersey Lottery to somehow be responsible fo his mistake.
I keep any tickets I purchase during the year. If you have a taxable winner, you can deduct the losing tickets. Why throw away a good tax deduction if you might need it?
Too bad, so sad. Throwing out a winning ticket , especially BEFORE the claim period is over, is just plain STUPID!! You don't deserve a judgement in your favor.....
I was about to comment and I saw your post, noise-gate, and I agree, for that reason alone, they do not want to start up all the crazys. It's tough, if it was me I'd be very unhappy, but it has to begin and end with the physical ticket. The fact that they are trying to say it's the Lottery's fault for not changing the number quick enough is a bad choice. You want to garner compassionate support, build social media popularity, go on Ellen, make the Commission see its good public relations to maybe give you a few hundred thousand. Get the media on your side from the jump before suing anybody. But being painted as nice guys went out the window with this approach! It takes about 15 minutes sometimes to see the change online. They blew it by not seeing the date was unchanged and then not holding the ticket until it could be checked from more than one source. I feel bad for them, I take no pleasure in calling them any names.
And besides, many times, I've played numbers, let the guy behind me go - maybe he plays only one number and it's in that game - then I turn around and decide to play more.
Since they regularly bought "tickets for each other" and their lawyer says the 3 tickets were bought in immediate succession it's pretty unlikely that there was a meaningful time between the sale of the first and third ticket. Even though 3 separate tickets were issued it was probably done as a single terminal transaction, and that would mean that proving conclusively that they bought all 3 tickets is probably very easy.
The real challenge will be the simple rule that the NJ lottery requires the winning ticket to be presented. Their argument about the timing of posting the winning numbers has about zero chance of success, so they'll need to convince a court that the rule can't be enforced. It may be a arbitrary, or even an unfair rule when there's clear proof that they're the lawful owners/purchasers of the winning ticket, but that doesn't mean it's not an enforceable rule they agreed to when the bought the ticket.
I think you're all missing the real point. It doesn't matter if they bought the winning ticket. The rules on every single website states that they have to present the ticket, signed, with the appropriate ID. The lawyer threw the red herring of them being able to prove they bought the winning ticket to distract from the real issue, which is, without the ticket you don't get paid. The lawsuit is nothing but a smoke screen being used to get around the rules. The fact that they were dumb enough not to check the date is just cherry on the sundae.
If I bought the winning Euromillions ticket, I couldn't sue them when they deny my claim because the rules state I have to be a resident of a specific country in order to collect. If I wasn't going to abide by their terms I should not have played. MM has its own rules. These two idiots don't get to circumvent the rules on the excuse that they're morons.
Isn't it kinda late even if they could prove it was their ticket? It's over a year later. I thought you had 6 months to claim?
Besides, it was their own fault. They admitted they were careless by not checking the date of the posted results. It's not as if the website posted incorrect information.
Except we have precedent where a winner was able to collect despite no longer having the winning ticket in their possession. Others have mentioned this as well, so I know I'm not making it up.
I'm not saying these folks should get the million. Frankly, I'm inclined to agree with the majority here that since they don't have the ticket, they don't have a claim. All I'm saying is that if everything else is in order, then maybe they have a case. If you were in their shoes, wouldn't you at least try?
When the two men went to the commission earlier this year with their claim they were told they were out of luck, their attorney says. "They were told that without the ticket they were not going to pay," said attorney Edward Logan.
From that I assumed they did make a claim without a ticket within the correct time. Their reason for not having the ticket is probably irrelevant in any court, but their case will involve trying to prove the unclaimed winning ticket was theirs. The story doesn't say if unclaimed ticket was sold in the store where they purchased their tickets and from all we know, there might not be an unclaimed $1 million ticket.
"It doesn't matter if they bought the winning ticket. The rules on every single website states that they have to present the ticket, signed, with the appropriate ID."
And examples were shown where players were paid without the winning ticket.
"The lawsuit is nothing but a smoke screen being used to get around the rules."
Their lawyer will show where lotteries made exceptions to the rules and why I said they have the "beginnings of a case". The N.J. Lottery knows if a winning $1 million PB ticket was sold at the Mahwah 7-11 and know if it was claimed. You're correct, they were very stupid for losing the ticket without double checking the results, but if it really was the winning ticket and nobody else made a claim, why should the lottery keep the winning?
"Except we have precedent where a winner was able to collect despite no longer having the winning ticket"
Is there a precedent in NJ? Each state gets to set their own rules for many aspects of multi-state games, without the consent of other states. That other states may bend their particular rules is irrelevant to NJ's choice to enforce theirs. I don't know about other states, but NY specifically allows people to claim without a ticket. In the case of Willis Willis mentioned earlier, the ticket was presented.
"The story doesn't say if unclaimed ticket was sold in the store where they purchased their tickets and from all we know, there might not be an unclaimed $1 million ticket."
It may not specifically say that, but it seems pretty clear. They regularly bought tickets at that store, and the lawyer is referring to the serial numbers of tickets 1 & 3. It's also a pretty safe bet that there is an unclaimed winner. If there wasn't I'm fairly sure the lottery would have thought that was a much better reason to deny payment than the claimants' failure to present a ticket.
He threw out the ticket oh well. That's not the fault of New Jersey. Hold your tickets until you are 100% certain you did not win some kind of prize!!!
Well I was laughing in the beginning but as I got towards the end I can see how they have a pretty good case...to blame the website/state of New Jersey is frivolous...here in Florida the tickets have the store number,time and ticket number on all purchased lottery tickets...the state of New Jersey knows exactly where that winning ticket was purchased...and the ticket number so on so forth they can look at the remaining tickets and see whether or not they are telling the truth...but dont give the money out so fast...wait until the ticket expire and if no one else has come forward then viola they are the winners...so give them the money...the puzzling thing is that they hired an attorney...I would have just followed my advice...wrote a letter to the right person and tried to do it myself...most of us pay attorneys for what we can do ourselves...I know if I accidentally throw away my winning ticket...I would want my money too...every year the lottery get away with millions of dollars in unclaimed prize money all because somebody unknowingly threw away their winning ticket...this is a case where they know they threw it away...so hey give it to them...the fact that they will have to wait months for it to expire and paying an attorney..them along with others have learned a very valuable lesson...BUT if some dumpster diving lottery ticket searching found their winning ticket and no signature...they lose...shall I say in that case...finders keepers losers weeper!!!
Everybody play to win...have a plan in place...look over your ticket...oh yeah..and sign them all as soon as you purchase them...
"Is there a precedent in NJ?"
Did you miss the part where I said the story doesn't go into much detail?
"It may not specifically say that, but it seems pretty clear."
I would have said the same thing if I thought somebody was going to nit-pic. For the record, was there a unclaimed ticket worth $1 million sold at the same store?
Their lawyer should google bearer instrument. If an agent of the lottery swindled the player like previous instances they may have a case but because the failed to look closely at the online results too bad. Most lottery websites have disclaimers that state they do their best to post accurate info but are not responsible for mistakes.
I noticed that despite the lack of detail you specifically said there's precedent, so I asked if you know if there's precedent that matters. I take it you don't?
I don't know whether or not an unclaimed ticket was sold, but when I speculate about the possibilities I do it based on what makes sense. Since it doesn't make sense for the lottery to deny their claim based on failure to present the ticket if they could deny it because a winning ticket was never even sold the sensible guess is that there was a wining ticket sold. You could have said that based on simple logic or a host of other reasons, but you apparently preferred to point out the unlikely possibility. I've got no idea how that makes the logical observation nitpicking.
Lack of details in this story doesn't change the fact there are precedents where players were paid without a ticket.
Pedro Quezada, a Dominican immigrant and the owner of the Apple Deli Grocery in Passaic won the March 2013 jackpot, the fourth largest in Powerball history. Quezada took his lottery winnings in a lump sum of $221 million or $152 million after taxes. "Imagine... so much money," Quezada said at a press conference held a few days after he'd won. "But it will not change my heart."
It doesn't make much sense to add this detail to the story either, but apparently somebody thought this was important.