A Vietnam-era veteran in Fall River, Massachusetts, who has been playing the same lottery numbers for years was shocked when the unthinkable happened.
Raymond Roberts Sr. recently won the state’s lottery game known as Lucky for Life, Fox 29 reported Monday.
The game awards winners $25,000 a year for a minimum 20 years. However, Roberts won six times in one drawing thanks to his idea to buy six tickets bearing the same numbers that are made up of anniversary dates and birthdays.
Following his big win, Roberts “claimed his prizes Thursday, December 15 at Massachusetts State Lottery headquarters in Dorchester,” the Massachusetts Lottery said in a news release Friday.
“He chose the $390,000 cash option on five of his prizes for a total of $1,950,000 (before taxes). Choosing the annuity option for one of his prizes, he received the first of a minimum of 20 annual payments of $25,000 (before taxes). He plans on using a portion of his winnings to buy a motorcycle,” the release continued.
The winning tickets were bought at Royal Liquors in Fall River and the store will get $30,000 in bonuses for selling them.
In January, a veteran from Cornelius, North Carolina, won $4 million playing the lottery thanks to numbers found inside a fortune cookie, Breitbart News reported.
“I don’t usually play my fortune cookie numbers but I tried them on a whim,” Gabriel Fierro told reporters.
Following the win, “I got an email in the morning and I just stared at it dumbfounded,” Fierro recalled, adding, “I took it and showed it to my wife and she thought it was an April Fool’s joke or maybe a scam.”
But when the two realized it was real, Fierro said, “We started running around the house screaming like a bunch of banshees.”
More recently, a woman in Louisville, Kentucky, won $175,000 thanks to a scratch-off lottery ticket she got during a company holiday party, according to Breitbart News.
“I couldn’t believe it. It was a twenty-five-dollar gift exchange, and I won one hundred seventy-five thousand dollars!” Lori Janes said.