Indiana lottery winners miss $100K payday due to ‘technical issue’ – forcing sales halt
An Indiana lottery player who thought he had won a life-changing $100,000 in a newly launched game got only $20, as officials blamed a “technical problem” for the confusion.
Mike Fields, a forklift driver in Indianapolis, bought 4 tickets to the first game of “Space Invaders Cash Invasion” when one of the cards revealed he won $100,000, according to FOX59.
Fields excitedly checked his winning ticket, only to find that the ticket was worth $20 instead of the “huge amount” he and his wife believed it to be, Angela Ganote, a reporter for the store, wrote on Facebook.
Fields rushed to Hoosier Lottery headquarters in Downtown Indianapolis to claim his winnings, but was turned away by officials who said the newly released game had a “technical problem.”
“They never told us ‘no’ they just said we won’t be paid today, and there’s really no other information except that we will be notified by post within 30 days,” he told the outlet.
The game, launched by the Hoosier Lottery on June 2, is modeled after the classic video game under the same name and challenges players to match their symbols with winning symbols to win cash prizes.
One feature of the game allows players who have a rocket ship to win a prize associated with it at that time.
Fields’ ticket featured a rocket ship with a combined prize value set at $100,000.
Lottery officials immediately removed the game tickets from the service and issued an advisory for the game on its website.
“The $5 SPACE INVADERS™ Cash Invasion Scratch-off was launched due to a technical issue. We have suspended ticket sales to ensure the gaming experience maintains the integrity we strive to provide,” the warning read.
The Lottery warned players who were experiencing problems with a purchased ticket to submit a protest form and a scratch card.
While Fields was at the lottery offices, he met several other “local raider” players with similar problems, but their big wins were in the low thousands, FOX59 reported.
Glendon Jones, another lottery player who bought Space Invaders scratch cards, believed he had won $2,500 and drove to state lottery headquarters in Indianapolis to claim his prize.
But when he got to the nation’s capital, Jones was told the system was out of order and he wasn’t getting any money.
“They told me to come down here to headquarters and they’re going to pay the ticket. I get here and they say there’s chaos, bad spelling and I’m out of luck,” Jones told a store outside Hoosier Lottery HQ.
