Indiana woman wins lottery and shared her joy on social media. It didn't end well

A lottery winner’s moment of celebration swiftly turned into despair after boasting about the win on social media. Drena Harris from Indiana won a $500 prize from the Indiana state “Hoosier” lottery last year and took to Facebook to share her excitement. While the prize wasn't groundbreaking, she still ended up sharing a picture of her ticket as proof of her win. This blunder later led to her losing the prize and all hopes of getting any money, The Sun reported.

Here's how social media stripped her of the lottery prize

Harris' celebration came to an end before she got a chance to claim her prize. One of the users who saw Harris' post used the image of her winning scratch card tried to scam a store clerk into giving them the prize. Thus, by using Harris' social media post, someone else claimed the $500 prize.

As per the official website of the Hoosier Lottery, participating retailers are allowed to give out prizes of up to $600. By the time Harris realized what had happened, it was already too late. The commission refused to pay another $500. Harris decided to take the matter to court and filed an appeal of the decision with a judge. However, by the time her case was presented in front of a judge, the store had already gone out of business for multiple months.  

With no evidence or any way to review the evidence, the court couldn't do anythng for Harris. The director of legal affairs and compliance of the lottery, Chuck Taylor explained that if Harris had acted quickly, she may have been able to get the amount.  

“We could have possibly [obtained evidence], but the retailer where it was cashed had not been a retailer for two months,” Taylor told WKRC. He added that the commission did not enjoy making the decision but they couldn't pay out the same prize twice. 

While Harris' luck dropped off quickly, a fellow Indiana resident and lottery winner ended up getting his prize despite getting his ticket torn into pieces. Paul Marshall, who won a $50,000 prize, took the ticket to a local retailer to confirm his prize. Since his prize was big, he was instructed to go to visit a payment office instead. However, the cashier accidentally tore off the ticket into pieces, according to the Indiana Chronicle. 

When Marshall went down to claim the cash prize with the torn ticket, he was initially denied. However, unlike Harris, Marshall's luck stuck with him and after making an appeal, all five commissioners from the Hoosier Lottery Commission approved his request.

As per the report, the commissioners were able to collect enough evidence from the security footage provided by the participating retailer that corroborated the winner's story.  “This was a fortunate event, where we were able to … reconstruct what happened,” Taylor told the news outlet talking about this case.