$250,000 winning Lottery ticket sold in W’burg so far unclaimed

So far no one has come forward to claim a $250,000 cash prize after purchasing a winning Mega Millions ticket at a Williamsburg market last week, according to the Kentucky Lottery Commission.

The ticket was purchased at Fast Track #3 in Williamsburg, which was formerly Huddleston’s BP.

Although no one has come forward to claim the winning ticket yet, Shinaz Vishnani, wife of owner Nizar Vishnani, is pretty sure that the winner is probably a local resident since the store doesn’t get a lot of interstate traffic.

"I have more local customers coming into my store than people off the interstate," Vishnani said.

The winner matched all five regular numbers successfully, but didn’t match the Gold Mega Ball. The odds of doing this are one in 3,904,701, according to the Kentucky Lottery Commission’s website.

Vishnani said that the phone call from lottery officials about the winning ticket was a nice one to get.

"I was really happy to hear that, especially since it was a Kentucky winner from my store from my customers here," she said. "I was really happy to hear it sold from my store."

Fast Track Market #3 received a check Thursday morning worth 1 percent of the winning ticket, or $2,500.

Vishnani said this is the largest winning lottery ticket that the Williamsburg store has sold in the six years her husband has owned the store in Williamsburg.

"We had sold one at our other store in Somerset, but this was the first time in this store," said Vishnani, whose husband owns five stores total.

Teresa Howard, an external sales representative for the Kentucky Lottery, said this is the biggest winner in Whitley County in quite some time.

The last big winner was during the early to mid-1990s, when Ray’s Superior Market sold a winning Powerball ticket worth millions of dollars.

Howard, who wasn’t the sales representative for the area then, said she can’t remember who the winner was, but that they were a biscuit maker.

Howard said that each day when lottery officials log onto their laptops, they get a report notifying them if they have a winner from their area.

"We go into a program and know if we have a winner or not, then I contact the owner," she said. "We get very excited. We get nothing from it, other than we are just so happy to have a winner and are so happy for someone to win the jackpot."

Prizes can be claimed up to 180 days after the date of the drawing for numbers games. After 90 days, the numbers game tickets that have won more than $50 must be claimed at a Kentucky Lottery office or they can be mailed to the claims department at: Kentucky Lottery Corporation_Claims Department 100_Louisville, KY 40287-0001.