Cash

The latest Powerball jackpot made a little history, and nearly made a little more, when the Newsstand at the Gallery sold the ticket that won Wednesday's drawing. It was, indeed, the biggest jackpot ever hit in Philadelphia: $172.7 million in 30 annual payments, or $107.5 million cash. The old record: $52 million for the annuity, $26.9 million for cash, hit by a ticket sold by University Deli in West Philadelphia in May 2004. It was claimed by brothers Jim Hare of Philadelphia and Tom Hare of Drexel Hill.

Upper Darby police say $8,000 is missing from their evidence room and may have gone up in smoke. Police Superintendent Michael J. Chitwood said that his department was investigating the money's disappearance, but that he feared it might have been accidentally destroyed. He asked the District Attorney's Office to conduct a separate investigation. Police confiscated the money in November 2009 after responding to a report of a domestic dispute and finding marijuana, crack cocaine, and the cash in the home.

Better to cash 'em than to trash 'em. In the case of three lottery tickets sold in the Philadelphia area, the cash is a nice piece of treasure. On Friday, Mega Millions produced two local $250,000 winners, one in Philadelphia and one in Delaware County. On Saturday, a $225,000 Cash 5 jackpot was won in Chester County. The Mega Millions tickets just missed the $12 million jackpot, matching the first five numbers - 4, 8, 17, 22 and 32, but not the Mega Ball, which was 8. They were sold at the Pathmark at 2101 Cottman Ave., in the Rhawnhurst section of Northeast Philadelphia, and at Westmont Beverage, 1101 Clifton Ave., in Collingdale.

A Bucks County judge Wednesday approved Prime Healthcare Services Inc.'s purchase of the cash-starved Lower Bucks Hospital. If the sale of the Bristol nonprofit to Prime or some other entity were rejected, "we would be forced to close it immediately," hospital chief executive Albert Mezzaroba testified at an Orphans' Court hearing in Doylestown. Mezzaroba said the hospital had only $2 million cash in the bank, including $1.5 million from a $3 million line of credit provided last month by Prime, a California for-profit that bought Roxborough Memorial Hospital in Philadelphia in February.

Was Gov. Corbett right to offer a budget that eliminates the minimal cash grants being made to Pennsylvania's poor?

A 40-year-old Philadelphia man has been arrested and charged with the July 14 armed robbery of Hymie's Restaurant, a well-known deli in Merion Station. Lower Merion Township police identified the suspect as Michael Shawn Schaefer. Schaefer, whose last known address is unclear, was apprehended July 24 by city and suburban police in the area of S. Fairhill Street in Philadelphia, according to Tom Walsh, the township's spokesman. On July 14 at 9:03 p.m., four armed robbers entered the restaurant on Montgomery Avenue and ordered everyone there to the front of the store, Walsh said.

On Monday, the New York Times revealed that the CIA has been funneling tens of millions of dollars to Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The monthly cash payments were meant to buy the mercurial leader's loyalty. But, according to the Times, the Langley-approved gravy train did more to fuel corruption in Afghanistan than anything else - the very corruption the U.S. government has been crusading against. None of this should be surprising. The CIA has a long history of showering cash on friendly heads of state.

Police are seeking help identifying a robber who took a man captive at gunpoint, forcing him to withdraw cash from an ATM in South Philadelphia before taking him to go to a 7-Eleven store to get more money. Inside the store, the victim turned on his captor and struggled with him as a surveillance camera recorded the action . Police gave this account: The 21-year-old victim was walking in the 2200 block of South Rosewood Street about 12:30 a.m. Monday when a man standing on the corner approached and asked for a lighter.

Three armed, masked men terrorized and robbed an Asian-American business owner and his family in their Radnor Township home late Wednesday night in yet another home invasion targeting people of Asian descent.   This time, the business owner was a dentist, with offices in Philadelphia and Coatesville. The Daily News last month wrote about this alarming trend in which armed thugs have followed Asian business owners to their homes in the belief that the victims stash cash at home.