Powerball: Downtown LA mini market owner to receive $1M after selling winning ticket worth $1B
DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- The owner of a downtown Los Angeles mini market is getting a $1 million check after selling a Powerball ticket worth $1.08 billion.
The owner of the Las Palmitas LA Mini-Mart is Maria Leticia Menjivar. She and her family, who are from El Salvador, have owned the store for about seven years.
This is their first big lottery win. They found out about the win - and about their prize for selling the winner - when media outlets began calling the store the morning after the win.
"We are so happy," said the owner's daughter, Angie. "We are more happy for the winner."
Earlier Thursday there was some confusion about the owner's identity.
Nabor Herrera is the store manager. When he showed up for work in the morning, due to a miscommunication, he was incorrectly identified in media reports as the store owner who was entitled to the $1 million.
Lottery officials give update after $1 billion Powerball ticket sold in LA
Carolyn Becker, a spokesperson for the California Lottery, said the person who purchased the winning ticket has not yet come forward publicly.
"We're standing here today wondering if the person who bought the ticket even realizes it yet. We won't know at the lottery, the public won't know, until somebody comes forward and claims that prize."
Once that person comes forward, Becker said they'll go through a vetting process to ensure they are the legitimate winner. They have up to a year to claim the prize.
The winning numbers for Wednesday night's drawing were: white balls 7, 10, 11, 13, 24 and red Powerball 24.
Final ticket sales pushed the jackpot beyond its earlier estimate of $1 billion to $1.08 billion at the time of the drawing, moving it from the seventh largest to the sixth largest U.S lottery jackpot ever won.
The winner can choose either the total jackpot paid out in yearly increments or a $558.1 million lump sum before taxes.
The game's abysmal odds of 1 in 292.2 million are designed to build big prizes that draw more players. The largest Powerball jackpot was $2.04 billion in November - a ticket that was also sold in Southern California.
The last time someone had won the Powerball jackpot was April 19 for a top prize of nearly $253 million. Since then, no one had won the grand prize.
CORRECTION: This story has been updated to correctly identify the owner of Las Palmitas Mini Market.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
