RALEIGH - With less than two full business days left before his $200,000 Powerball ticket was set to expire, Ramin Farro of Winterville claimed a prize he hadn’t even realized he’d won for the past six months. Farro bought a Powerball ticket for the July 9 drawing when he was visiting a friend of his in Greensboro. He says he plays occasionally, but put the ticket away on his dresser at home and quickly forgot about it.
Then he got a call last week from the same friend in Greensboro urging him to check the numbers on his ticket. His friend had seen the reports of an expiring ticket bought at the Wilco on Lawndale Avenue in Greensboro, where Farro had purchased his ticket. All five white balls matched, making his ticket worth $200,000.
Farro called the North Carolina Education Lottery (NCEL) headquarters to confirm the numbers, and then traveled to Raleigh on Friday to claim his prize. He says he will use the money for investments and maybe take a vacation.
In Saturday night’s Powerball drawing, two tickets matched four out of five white balls plus the Powerball. The normal payout for this combination is $10,000, but one of the two tickets was Power Played and is worth $30,000 since the Power Play multiplier for the drawing was three. This ticket was sold at Country Cupboard on Statesville Boulevard in Salisbury. The other ticket was not Power Played and is worth $10,000. This ticket was sold at Fuel Doc on U.S. 64 Alternate West in Rocky Mount.
A total of 47,305 North Carolina Powerball players won prizes in the Saturday, Jan. 3 Powerball drawing, ranging from $30,000 down to $3 for a total payout in prizes worth $392,281. No one matched all five white balls plus the Powerball, so the jackpot for the Wednesday, Jan. 7 Powerball drawing is an estimated $105 million.
The North Carolina Education Lottery (NCEL) has paid out more than $4.6 million total in instant scratchoff ticket prizes since Friday, Jan. 2. Also since Friday, “Carolina Cash 5” players have won more than $102,000 and “Carolina Pick 3” players have won more than $1 million in prizes.
