Ocean County Winners Of Powerball Want To Stay Private

A group of Ocean County employees says they hold one of the winning Powerball tickets but are not ready to go public yet.

The Press of Atlantic City first reported that sixteen employees from the Ocean County Vehicle Maintenance Department have told Freeholder Jack Kelly that they have one of the three winning tickets from Wednesday night's drawing purchased at the Acme supermarket in Little Egg Harbor.

They will likely turn the ticket into the New Jersey Lottery early next week according to the Star-Ledger.  Ocaen County Administrator Carl Block told the newspaper that all 16 want to maintain their privacy for now. He described the group as a wide range of men and woman in their 20s to being close to retirement.

Each winning ticket was worth $86 million before taxes, or $58.3 million after taxes, if taken in a lump sum. They are worth $149.4 million over 30 years if the winners choose the annuity option.

“I got a call today from Jim Pine (Director of the Vehicle Maintenance Department)  who told me that a group of his employees had won. It’s a great thing,” Kelly told the newspaper.

Pine told the Press  that the employees, despite their newly won riches, came to work on Thursday. "They’re a group of wonderful, hardworking people, and them showing up for work today ought to tell you something,” said Pine, who would not identify the workers. It's not known how many of them came to work on Friday.

“From what I hear they’re all like a really great group of guys and they deserve it. And I think one of them was affected by the storm, at least one of them, so they deserve it for sure,” Brittany Wainwright of Little Egg Harbor told KYW TV.

The Second Ticket In New Jersey

The second winning ticket from New Jersey was sold at the Stop and Shop supermarket in South Brunswick; the holder of that winning ticket remains anonymous.

According to the Patch of South Brunswick, this is the second big winning ticket sold at the store. A ticket sold in 2012 for the next level of prize, $1million for matching 5 numbers, went unclaimed.

The third winning ticket was turned in today by Paul White, 45, a project engineer from Ham Lake, Minnesota.