Wrong Scratch No Bar for Winners of Lottery

State lottery winners who mistakenly scratch off a portion of their tickets marked “void if removed” will have to wait several extra days for their $100-through-$5,000 prizes but will get their winnings, lottery officials said Monday.

The “void if removed” section is located just beneath the six latex-covered squares that players scratch off trying to win various amounts of money printed underneath. If a player has three matching squares, it’s a winning ticket.

But many people--particularly non-English-speaking players--are scratching the latex off the “void if removed” section as well, uncovering a control number used by lottery security officials to make sure that the ticket has not been tampered with.

“We’re pretty sure this is being done innocently, but this may hold up prizes for several days” while the ticket gets an additional security inspection, lottery spokesman Bob Taylor said.

The extra security check would affect only $100, $500, $1,000 and $5,000 winning tickets, which must be sent to Sacramento to be redeemed.

All $2 and $5 winners are paid directly by the retailer who sold the ticket. Lottery director Mark Michalko also is recommending that retailers extend a “grace period” to players who turn back winning $2 and $5 tickets with the void warning removed.

Tickets sales have begun to taper off from the furious pace that saw 21.4 million sold in the first 24 hours of the lottery. As of Monday afternoon, lottery officials estimated that 56.5 million had been sold over the four-day period that began at 12:30 p.m. Thursday. A total of 942 people had claimed $5,000 prizes as of noon Monday.

“I’m extremely grateful that there has been such a strong outpouring of public acceptance for the lottery,” Michalko said. “This response has far exceeded our expectations.”

Meanwhile, lottery officials announced Monday that 10 firms have said they will bid on the massive $200-million, four-year contract to set up the state’s first computerized numbers game next year, despite rigid financial disclosure laws requiring top officers, stockholders and directors of the companies to reveal income tax data and other personal financial information.

Included among the largest companies saying they will bid are Control Data Corp., General Instruments Corp., GTECH Corp., International Totalizator Systems, Scientific Games and Syntech International.