{"id":76944,"date":"2026-08-18T06:19:32","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T06:19:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/a-mystery-winner-claimed-24-million-just-two-days-before-the-deadline-officials-think-they-waited-on-purpose\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T06:19:32","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T06:19:32","slug":"a-mystery-winner-claimed-24-million-just-two-days-before-the-deadline-officials-think-they-waited-on-purpose","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/a-mystery-winner-claimed-24-million-just-two-days-before-the-deadline-officials-think-they-waited-on-purpose\/","title":{"rendered":"A Mystery Winner Claimed $24 Million Just Two Days Before the Deadline. Officials Think They Waited on Purpose"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b>(Originally posted on : Bitcoin News )<\/b><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"@container mb-[25px] rounded-sm overflow-clip py-0.5 pr-0.5 pl-2.5 bg-success-100\">\n<div class=\"flex flex-col gap-m overflow-clip rounded-[6px] !bg-success-10 p-3 @[420px]:p-m\">\n<h2 class=\"m-0 flex items-center gap-s text-[19px] !text-[#1c1c1c] md:text-[20px]\"><svg xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"16\" height=\"10\" viewbox=\"0 0 16 10\" fill=\"none\" class=\"shrink-0 text-success-100\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><path d=\"M1 1.5h14\" stroke=\"currentColor\" stroke-width=\"2.5\" stroke-linecap=\"round\"\/><path d=\"M1 8.5h10\" stroke=\"currentColor\" stroke-width=\"2.5\" stroke-linecap=\"round\"\/><\/svg><span>Key Takeaways<\/span><\/h2>\n<ul class=\"m-0 flex list-none flex-col gap-m pl-0\">\n<li class=\"m-0 flex items-start gap-s !text-[#434248]\"><span class=\"mt-2 size-2 shrink-0 rounded-full bg-success-100\" aria-hidden=\"true\"\/><span class=\"text-body\">New York Lottery paid $24 million after Smith claimed the ticket on May 23, 2017.<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"m-0 flex items-start gap-s !text-[#434248]\"><span class=\"mt-2 size-2 shrink-0 rounded-full bg-success-100\" aria-hidden=\"true\"\/><span class=\"text-body\">New York Lottery\u2019s last-minute publicity helped save a $24 million jackpot from expiring.<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"m-0 flex items-start gap-s !text-[#434248]\"><span class=\"mt-2 size-2 shrink-0 rounded-full bg-success-100\" aria-hidden=\"true\"\/><span class=\"text-body\">Smith had just 2 days left before the New York Lotto ticket expired on May 25, 2017.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>A single $24 million New York Lotto ticket sold on 5\/25\/2016 at Renu Corp Grocery &amp; Tobacco in Tribeca sat unclaimed for nearly a year, even as the deadline to cash it in crept closer. The New York Lottery took the unusual step of pushing last-minute reminders to \u201cCheck your pockets. Check your glove box. Look under the couch cushions.\u201d Then, on 5\/23\/2017, a winner walked into the Beaver Street Customer Service Center in Lower Manhattan with just two days to spare, saying the news coverage finally prompted a search through old tickets at home. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t happen often that we put out a press release at the last minute and a winner comes forward,\u201d lottery director Gweneth Dean told CBS New York.<\/p>\n<h2>A $24 million ticket nearly lost to time<\/h2>\n<p>If you follow tech and money long enough, you start to notice how often value hides in plain sight. In this case, it was a piece of paper, not a private key. A single New York Lotto jackpot ticket worth $24 million sat unclaimed for nearly a year after it was sold on May 25, 2016, at Renu Corp Grocery &amp; Tobacco in Tribeca, Manhattan.<\/p>\n<p>The clock mattered because New York Lottery prizes have a hard rule: claim within 1 year of the drawing. That meant the deadline was the end of the day on May 25, 2017, a cutoff that can turn a windfall into a missed opportunity with no appeals, no customer support chat, no password reset.<\/p>\n<h2>A public nudge, then a real person shows up<\/h2>\n<p>As the deadline approached, the New York Lottery went public with a search for the missing winner, urging people to double-check what they had tucked away. Gweneth Dean told players to, \u201cCheck your pockets. Check your glove box. Look under the couch cushions.\u201d The appeal was widely repeated as the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/newyork\/news\/unclaimed-24million-ny-lotto-ticket-tribeca\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">$24 million ticket<\/a> neared expiration.<\/p>\n<p>Then, on May 23, 2017, the mystery winner arrived at the New York Lottery\u2019s Beaver Street Customer Service Center in Lower Manhattan and claimed the prize, just 2 days before it would have expired. Dean, the Director of the New York State Gaming Commission\u2019s Division of the Lottery, later said, \u201cIt doesn\u2019t happen often that we put out a press release at the last minute and a winner comes forward.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>The moment of discovery: a pile of old tickets<\/h2>\n<p>The winner said the news coverage prompted the search at home: a check through a pile of old lottery tickets that had been sitting around, waiting. The winning numbers from that May 25, 2016 drawing were 05-12-13-22-25-35, with bonus number 51, a detail that turns a vague hunch into a verifiable match.<\/p>\n<p>Dean\u2019s official reaction kept the focus on timing and relief. \u201cWe are thrilled that this lucky winner was able to locate this life-changing ticket,\u201d she said, adding, \u201cWe look forward to introducing this multimillionaire who came forward in the nick of time,\u201d per the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/newyork\/news\/24-million-winning-lottery-ticket-claimed\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">New York Lottery release<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>A tiny storefront\u2019s \u201cbig one,\u201d and a name revealed later<\/h2>\n<p>Back at 158 Church Street, the win landed differently: proof that a modest corner shop can be the starting point for a headline-sized payout. The store owner told CBS2 reporter Vanessa Murdock, \u201cFirst time I sell a big one.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Months later, an October 2017 CNN report identified the winner as a retired security officer surnamed Smith, who found the ticket in an old shirt in his closet after seeing a news story about the search, <a href=\"https:\/\/abcnews.com\/US\/24-million-lottery-winner-forward-days-deadline\/story?id=47609227\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">2 days before the deadline<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/news.bitcoin.com\/featured\/a-mystery-winner-claimed-24-million-just-two-days-before-the-deadline-officials-think-they-waited-on-purpose-49201\/\">Source link <\/a><br \/>\n<br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(Originally posted on : Bitcoin News ) Key Takeaways New York Lottery paid $24 million after Smith claimed the ticket on May 23, 2017. New York Lottery\u2019s last-minute publicity helped save a $24 million jackpot from expiring. Smith had just 2 days left before the New York Lotto ticket expired on May 25, 2017. A [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":76945,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76944"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76944\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowdfundjunction.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}