The error by the Massachusetts State Lottery over which store sold the lone winning Powerball ticket is being blamed on nerves.
Michael Sweeney, the lottery’s executive director, tells WBZ-AM they had a “couple of excited people at 1 o’clock in the morning” but said if there’s any blame to be placed, the buck stops with him.
The lottery initially said a convenience store in Watertown had sold the winning ticket. A few hours later, it announced it had made a mistake, and that the winning ticket was sold across the state at the Pride Station & Store in Chicopee, in Western Massachusetts.
Sweeney says the lottery had not yet heard from the winner.
He said the Chicopee store will receive $50,000 for selling the winning ticket, he said.
He said the store in Watertown did sell a ticket that won a $1 million prize.
Massachusetts State Lottery officials have corrected the site where the single winning ticket for the Powerball $758.7 million jackpot was sold to Chicopee, not Watertown.
The Massachusetts State Lottery had announced around 2:30 a.m. that a convenience store in Watertown, near Boston, had sold the winning ticket.
But shortly before 8 a.m., the lottery said it had made a mistake, and that the winning ticket was sold across the state at the Pride Station & Store in Chicopee, in Western Massachusetts.
The lottery did not say how the error was made .
It said the store in Watertown did sell a ticket that won a $1 million prize.
Earlier, before learning about the mess up, the owner of Handy Variety have said she is happy and emotional after learning her store sold it.
Kamaljeet Kaur, who owns Handy Variety in Watertown, Massachusetts, said she was getting ready to come to work yesterday morning when her husband told her.
Reporters descended on the store hours before it opened around 6:30 a.m.
The jackpot is the largest grand prize won by a single lottery ticket in U.S. history. MDT/AP
