Imagine winning your dream Powerball lottery only to be denied the prize due to a website glitch.
This is reportedly what happened to John Cheeks, a lottery player who found himself entangled in a $340 million controversy.
Man Takes Legal Action Against Powerball
The Washington D.C. local is now suing the company for making a “mistake” despite Cheeks’ ticket numbers matching with those for the jackpot prize.
According to the New York Post, the recently filed complaint claims that on January 6, 2023, Cheeks decided to play the Powerball lottery.
The live drawing occurred on January 7, 2023. The plaintiff says he missed the results, prompting him to check the winning numbers on the website on January 8.
Much to his surprise, his ticket matched the numbers on his screen.
“I just politely called a friend. I took a picture as he recommended, and that was it. I went to sleep,” Cheeks told NBC 4 Washington.
His understandable excitement lasted for three days, during which time his winning ticket numbers remained on the official DC Lottery page. But things quickly took a turn for the worse when Cheeks attempted to claim his prize on January 10 at a licensed retailer.
That’s when he learned that the numbers on the DC Lottery page did not match the numbers that were announced during the live drawing.
Powerball Claims They Face A Glitching Issue
He escalated the matter by visiting the DC Office of Lottery and Gaming prize center, hoping for a different outcome. But, to his astonishment, he was once again denied his winnings. “Hey, this ticket is no good. Just throw it in the trash can,” Cheeks was told.
“And I gave him a stern look. I said, ‘In the trash can?’ ‘Oh yeah, just throw it away. You’re not gonna get paid. There’s a trash can right there.’” But he was not ready to give up. He placed his ticket in a safety deposit box and decided to fight for his perceived winnings.
When he hired a lawyer to file a complaint against the company, he received a response stating that Powerball had experienced a “glitch” on its website. Inadvertently, the company had posted the wrong winning numbers on the website, so Cheeks couldn’t redeem his prize.
However, his attorney, Richard Evans, feels that Powerball needs to rectify the situation since they have already admitted to their mistake.
“They have said that one of their contractors made a mistake,” he expressed. “I haven’t seen the evidence to support that yet.”
“Even if a mistake was made, the question becomes: What do you do about that?” he said. “There is a precedent for this, a similar case that happened in Iowa, where a mistake was admitted to by a contractor and they paid the winnings out.”
Roomies, would y’all have been upset if this happened to you, and would you have sought legal action?
