ok let me add my 2 cents worth on this subject. In july of 2003 I was in a convenience store having some tickets scanned. the guy working the store was from the middle east. he scanned several tickets, and finally I heard the winning tone on the machine, meaning I had a winning ticket, well like a fool I walked away from the machine to get a soft drink, and when I did the tone sounded yet again. But when I inquired about the second ticket he said it was not a winner, then when I asked to see it, he flashed it quickly in front of my face, stating he was very busy, yet there was only one other customer in the store. He had a look on his face like the cat who ate the canary. later he said he did not know how much I had won on the one winning ticket, I clearly told hime there was 2 winning tickets and he kept denying such. after several minutes of argument and confusion he paid me $9.00 and said he was very busy again even though there was only 2 people in the store then. I took the nine dollars regrettably and said to him he was wrong as I went out he door. I did not go back in the store for 2 weeks, when I did I discovered he had left and went back to Syria to visit his family. I asked his business partner when would he be back and he stated in a few days, I also mentioned the incident to him and he became irate, he also was a from the middle east... I asked him politely to have his partner call me and we could sit down and talk about what had happened. he refused to even call him. as time went on he said his partner had wanted out of the business and would not be coming back to the area. I contacted the lottery department and they supposedly investigated the incident. they never could tell me though whether the winning ticket was mine or not. bottom line is I should never have left the store on that day, I should have signed the back of trhe ticket. He has yet to be seen in 2 years, my guess is it was at least a $100,000 ticket because all of the tickets checked were cash 5 tickets. with top prize at $100,000. next top prize is $100.00 he did not leave town for a $100.00. recently his partner is in trouble for selling black market cigarettes, what goes around, comes around I guess.