Ticket mistake earns Michigan man a $1M lottery prize
April 21 (UPI) -- A Michigan man said a store cashier's mistake turned out to be lucky when the scratch-off lottery ticket he didn't ask for turned out to be a $1 million winner.
The 45-year-old Van Buren County man told Michigan Lottery officials he asked for a specific scratch-off lottery ticket at the Speedway gas station on South Kalamazoo Street in Paw Paw, but the clerk instead handed him a Major Cashword ticket.
"I play Cashword tickets occasionally, but purchasing this ticket was a total fluke," the player said. "I asked the cashier for a different game, and she mistakenly handed me this Major Cashword ticket instead. When she realized she gave me the wrong ticket, she offered to give me the game I'd asked for, but I told her I would just keep the Major Cashword ticket instead."
The man said the decision proved fortuitous.
"The next morning, I scratched the barcode and my wife scanned the ticket on her lottery app. When $1 million came up on the screen, I felt like I couldn't breathe! I thought it was some sort of prank at first," he said.
The winner had an unconventional method for keeping his prized ticket safe.
"Once I realized it was real, I put the ticket in a jar and buried it in the yard because I was so paranoid something would happen to it if I kept it in the house," he said.
The winner said his prize money will go toward paying off his house, paying bills and saving for retirement.
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