Steve Harvey, FTW
By Kate Northrop
SILVER SPRING, Md. — A Maryland woman won $50,000 on a scratch-off lottery ticket, but her hiding spot was apparently so good that she forgot where she put it.
Srijana Wosti was in a panic when she realized that the claims deadline was approaching for a $50,000 winning lottery ticket she could not find.
A scratch-off ticket was hiding somewhere in Wosti's home, waiting to be cashed in. Thankfully, the winner's hunt was successful, but it was not without stress.
Sometime "around June," Wosti was out for a stroll in the park. She had just had her second child and felt lucky while out on her walk. She stopped at Kemp Mill Beer, Wine & Deli on Lamberton Drive in Silver Spring and picked out a $5 "Family Feud" scratch-off ticket for herself.
"I like to watch the show on television," Wosti told the Maryland Lottery. "And, I like that Steve Harvey."
She scratched the ticket while in the store and believed it to be a $50 winner, but the Lottery's app told her to tack on a few more zeros — she had instead won $50,000.
"I kept scanning it over and over," the 41-year-old said. "I was so happy."
Of course, she shared the news of the win with her family, but being a full-time mother of a 2-year-old and an infant meant she was busy. She hid the ticket in a suitcase for the time being.
Fast forward to this month, and Wosti remembered she had a little ticket somewhere in her home worth $50,000. Fearing that the expiration date of the claims period was fast approaching, she rummaged through the house before finally rediscovering it in the suitcase.
"I was so relieved to find it," she said, sighing, "and to know I wasn't too late."
Lottery winners in Maryland have 182 days to collect prizes from scratch-off tickets. Having bought the ticket "around June," it is possible that the ticket was set to expire this month.
The winnings, Wosti said, will help pay family bills, but the retailer will also be able to celebrate a $500 bonus commission from the Lottery for selling the ticket.
The $5 "Family Feud" scratch-off game, which launched in April, has three out of ten top prizes of $50,000, two out of 12 second-tier prizes of $5,000, and seven out of 30 third-tier prizes of $1,000 remaining.
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Congrats to her. She actually won more than some of the actual contestants on the show without having to travel to Hollywood. Looking for that ticket while at the same time hoping that it had not expired must have been absolute mental anguish, so glad she found it in time.
By the headline, I thought this was going to be the same infamous Maryland woman who claimed she hid the winning ticket somewhere at McDonald's. Still my fave lottery story.
This one?
https://www.lotterypost.com/news/244507
Yes. How could I forget Mirlande and all the others posting online that they had the winning ticket. Something was in the air during that Jackpot. I haven't seen a jp since then that brought that degree of lunatics out into the open.
* Steve to Srijana..
"Sending you forget me not to help you to remember, baby please forget me not l want you to remember!"
* Forgets Me Nots- Patrice Rushen.
Congratulations! Now when she hits the big one please take advantage of MD's anonymity law for lottery winners.
BTW Silver Spring my old stomping ground right on the DC border while stationed @ Walter Reed Army Medical Center in DC which has now moved to Bethesda, MD. (Military regulations stipulate that Medical centers retain their original name.)
You have a good memory! I had forgotten about that one. That was pretty nutty.
It was also the only live drawing that I have ever watched. I recall her attorney quickly dropped her once he figured out she was lying.
As the numbers were being drawn, I thought do not let me win the JP. Second place is fine with me. Lol
The article states: "Lottery winners in Maryland have 182 days to collect prizes from scratch-off tickets."
My question: How would the MD Lottery know when a winning scratch-off ticket has been sold?
Also, if she won in June, why wait six months to claim the winnings?
This is why you put your tickets in the same place all the time... this happened to me one time but it was a $200 winning ticket... I learned a big lesson from that... btw I found the ticket by back tracking what I did that day
For scratch games, the expiration date is usually calculated from when the game is canceled.
Thats a good point. I don't see the clerks running the scratch offs thru the machine to tell it that the ticket was sold. They just pull them out and hand them over.
Yes Todd, the expiration date is usually calculated from when the game is canceled, but she probably wouldn't have known if and when that particular game was to be canceled or when it would happen.
I agree. She was being smart to make a worst-case assumption that she bought the ticket on the last available date.