Looking at lottery winners stories is almost always inspiring, except when you have played and felt that it was your time to shine. Past stories are frustration-proof and will probably make you feel capable of winning or at least decide to give it a try. For that mission, we selected the 15 most exciting lottery winning stories from around the globe.
As a plus, for those who are really curious, we have also picked five tragic lottery winners stories. You can skip those and go straight to a few hints for those who want to be the next name among the best lottery winners stories.
Quick Jump
- The 4 Most Exciting US Lottery Winners Stories
- 6 Best Lottery Winning Stories in the United Kingdom
- 5 Exciting Lottery Winners Stories from Around the World
- The 5 Most Tragic Lottery Winners Stories
- How to Know If the Lottery Winners Stories are Real?
- How to Become a Lottery Winner Too?
- The Best Tips from Real Lottery Winners
- FAQs
The 4 Most Exciting US Lottery Winners Stories
It is obvious to think that the United States, land of impressive billionaire lottery prizes and the most famous lotteries in the world, like the US Powerball, has some of those stories. Let’s reveal the real and exciting lottery winners stories from the US.
Clarance W. Jones – The Man Who Cracked the Lottery?
Source: bostonherald.com
Clarance Jones of Massachusetts won nothing less than $18 million in 10 years, enough to retire and enjoy his life. He claimed a total of 10,000 winning tickets, and that is an impressive mark. Not fond of discretion, he called himself a “professional gambler” and told people he had the perfect methodology that cracked the lottery.
That is, without a doubt, an exciting lottery winner story. It has a twist, though. The 81-year-old “professional” went to prison in September 2019 after being considered guilty of fraud. He filed false tax returns on behalf of winners, and that is how he managed to accumulate so many wins. As an 81-year-old man, he only took two months of the three years the federals wanted him to catch. It is an exciting but not truly happy story.
Kenneth J. Stokes Doubled His Prize By Mistake
Source: abcnews.go.com
This is the crazy and exciting story of the lottery winner Kenneth J. Stokes of Norwood, Massachusetts. He could have won the secondary prize once, but a distraction made him double his prize in the game Lucky for Life. Since the game pays the same amount for every player, he won the prize of $500,000 twice.
He had a call from the lottery officials telling him that he and another person from Norwood had won the prize. As soon as he hung out, he realized he had bought a ticket with the same family lucky numbers their relative had already gifted him with a season pass. Since nothing excludes the possibility of being the winner twice, the Lucky for Life results for him were $1,000,000 before taxes.
He could have chosen to win $25,000 a year for 20 years for each ticket, but he decided to go for the lump sum. After the discounts and taxes, he ended up with a $546,000 prize, twice as much as he would have won with a single ticket.
Modern Bonnie and Clyde Reinvested Stolen Money
Source: seattletimes.com
If by an exciting lottery winner story you mean you want some adrenaline, check out what happened to a modern Bonnie and Clyde. Joan Lechleiner and her fiancé, Kerry Titus, of Pottsville, stole $175,000 from a grocery store.
That would be just regular assault news were it not for the fact that the couple used some of the stolen money to purchase Cash 5 tickets and won. Believe it or not, Joan and Kerry claimed a share of the $1,047,618 prize, a total of $261,904.50. In the end, they did not enjoy the money, proving that crime does not pay – the online lottery does, though.
Richard Lustig – Seven Times a Winner
Source: today.com
Many people who play both physical and online lotteries know the name, Richard Lustig. The man from Florida used to say that he had a strategy for lottery numbers. He passed away in 2018 but left a history of seven lottery victories from 1993 to 2010.
Even though that is a long period of time, most people spend 20, 30 years playing the lottery without winning big prizes. Lustig, on the other hand, is known to have claimed over US$1 million in varied games such as Fantasy 5.
6 Best Lottery Winning Stories in the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom has great charity lotteries, not to mention the possibility of playing one of the best lotteries in Europe and discovering you are the winner through our Euromillions results. Therefore, it is obvious that we would find exciting lottery winners stories from the UK.
Natalie Metcalf – One Million and a Baby
Source: metro.co.uk
Natalie Metcalf from Thornbury, Gloucestershire, played the UK Millionaire Maker raffle from Euromillions through the National Lottery. As soon as she figured out she had won, Natalie, who was pregnant at the time, went out to celebrate with her partner Andy Symes, 43.
Before they could celebrate, however, the excitement led her into labor a month early. Fortunately, she gave birth to a healthy girl, and they are probably enjoying their one million pounds prize.
Everybody Gets Rich Together
Source: dailymail.co.uk
Imagine winning £114.9 million in Euromillions’s New Year’s Day jackpot. That is what happened to Patrick and Frances Connolly in 2019. They are a businessman and a retired teacher who did not want to enjoy their new life alone and wrote down a list of 50 people they wanted to share their jackpot with.
That is not all they did with the money, as they bought a new house and retired. They have a big family, and their relatives are most probably on the huge list they wrote.
Bev Doran Kept Her Essence
Source: bbc.com
Bev Doran, a single mom who won £14 million playing EuroMillions in 2017, is the best person that could have won the lottery, according to people who know her. Bev and her four kids were leaving on a £320-a-week benefit when she won.
She got herself a new place, but not far from her neighborhood so that her children could keep in contact with their friends. She had said that to her friends when she won the lottery and kept her word. Aside from a better life for her family, she also set up a charitable foundation that helps small organizations around the world.
Rich at the Age of 16
Source: dailymail.co.uk
You might already have heard about Callie Rogers, who won the National Lottery in 2003 at the age of 16 only. In the United Kingdom, you are eligible to play the lottery from that age. She won around £1.87 million and spent almost half of it on gifts, clothes, and aesthetic procedures. That was expected from winning so much money at such a young age.
Rich at the Age of 16
You might already have heard about Callie Rogers, who won the National Lottery in 2003 at the age of 16 only. In the United Kingdom, you are eligible to play the lottery from that age. She won around £1.87 million and spent almost half of it on gifts, clothes, and aesthetic procedures. That was expected from winning so much money at such a young age.
Source: manchestereveningnews.com
A Lucky Penny Gave Him £1.8m
Source: dorsetecho.co.uk
Sean Lloyd from Cheshire was truly struggling as a bus driver and father of four. He found a penny outside a shop and rubbed it on the ticket he had just bought. His luck struck, and he thought he had won around £1,000 until he noticed that he had the bonus number and won £1.8 million.
Now, he has enough time to dedicate to his hobby and created his own sauce, being an amateur chef. His wife continues to work as a carer because she likes it, but no longer with a double shift.
Aaron Smith – All That You’ve Got to Do Is Believe
The title might sound like a cliche motivation phrase, but Aaron Smith and his family could say otherwise. The Euromillions raffle Millionaire Maker made that family one million pounds richer. The exciting story behind it is quite intriguing.
Aaron and his family invented a game on Christmas in which they pretended to have won the lottery. They took pictures celebrating, had a toast and all. By checking the Euromillions results for the raffle, he figured out they had actually won with a number of his.
5 Exciting Lottery Winners Stories from Around the World
While there are many exciting lottery winners stories in the United Kingdom, there are many countries around the world that participate in millionaire lottery games. Those are the best because that is where the best lottery stories come from. Let’s take a look at the 5 most exciting winners stories from European, Australian, and Canadian lotteries.
It Can Be About Giving Back
Source: cambridge-news.co.uk
Gillian and Adrian Bayford from Haverhill won the Euromillions jackpot of £148.7 million back in August 2012. The couple that had been through tough times said that their first deed would be to pay back everyone who had helped them before the prize. With the check on his hands, Adrian joked about having almost forgotten to purchase the tickets.
70 Lucky Winners of SuperEnalotto
Everyone knows the benefits of playing in a lottery syndicate, in which case you share the prize in exchange for improving your odds. The first syndicate prize ever paid by the SuperEnalotto Italian game was won in 2010 and generated more than €2.5 million for each participant, from a total prize of €177.7 million.
Two Times a Winner With the Same Numbers
The trajectory of the lucky player whose name is unknown started back in 1976 when the national lottery in France began. He chose some random numbers, just like we generate on our Quick Picks page, and started to play them until he won his first prize equivalent to €2.8 million in 1996.
That would be excellent already, but this lottery story becomes exciting when we discover that he repeated the win in August 2011 with the same numbers, claiming €3 million more. The odds of winning the lottery twice with the same numbers is 1 in 363 billion. Having spent around €1,000 on tickets, that is an excellent payoff, and he decided to keep playing.
A Lottery Winner and an Activist
Source: thestar.com
If there is a thing that can test someone’s devotion to a cause, winning the lottery is a strong candidate for being it. Robert “Erb” won $25 million playing Lotto MAX from Canada in November 2012. His generosity started in sharing the prize with relatives and friends, but it did not stop there. He pledged support to several charitable organizations and even donated $1,000,000 to support marijuana legalization.
It Was and Was Not His Time at the Same Time
Source: dailymail.co.uk
If you want the title to make some sense, we present you to Bill Morgan. The Australian lottery winner survived a horrible car crash in 1998 and had a heart attack in the sequence. When the medical team was trying to save him, he had a severe allergic reaction. He was clinically dead for almost 15 minutes, but this is not a tragic story.
He was revived in a vegetative state for more than a week until he woke up. Once he got out of the hospital, he got engaged and purchased a scratch-off ticket that resulted in a car. A local TV station asked him to scratch another ticket for the reportage recording. His reenactment revealed a prize of A$250,000, and his excitement was caught on camera.
The 5 Most Tragic Lottery Winners Stories
If you are happy about the most exciting lottery winners stories and not willing to risk it with tragic stories, skip it to our next topics. Otherwise, there are some interesting stories that will keep you entertained a bit more.
Jack Whittaker
Source: nytimes.com
Back in 2002, the biggest Powerball jackpot at that time went to Jack Whittaker, who collected $315 million and had the chance of changing his life for good. Unfortunately, thieves broke into his car twice and took away thousands of dollars. That would not have been enough to affect his new way of living, but his company received many lawsuits, and even Jack himself was sued by a woman for groping her.
That would already have been bad enough, but his granddaughter Brandi used the money he gave her on drugs and died of an overdose. Jack’s daughter passed away of mysterious causes, and that was the tragic story of a lottery winner.
William Post III
Source: loveinc.com
The story of William Post III started with everything to become one of the most exciting lottery winners stories on this page. He had less than $2.50 in his bank account when he won the $16.2 million prize of the Pennsylvania lottery in 1988.
Unfortunately, he was spending a lot buying cars and establishments. Even an airplane was added to his shopping list. With annual payments, he quickly raised a debt that is not common for lottery winners. He continued, investing in ventures that would not profit at all, not to mention lawsuits against him. Finally, he went bankrupt and passed away in 2006.
Jeffrey Dampier
Source: allthatsinteresting.com/
Jeffrey Dampier played the Illinois Lottery and won $20 million. Spending on gifts for his family and investing in a new business would be a nice lottery winner story. Unlike other cases, the fault was not Jeffrey’s. His sister-in-law, Victoria Jackson, with whom he was having an affair, plotted to rob him nine years later. The plan worked, but everything went out of control at one point, and she shot him.
Urooj Khan
Source: bbc.com
Urooj Khan of Chicago was a gambling addict who spent a lot of money playing the lottery but finally won a $1 million prize. Unfortunately for him, he did not even have the chance to enjoy it, as he died soon after winning. The autopsy revealed that he died of cyanide poisoning, and his wife was the main suspect. However, the case found no closure.
Ibi Roncaioli
Source: thesun.co.uk
Ibi Roncaioli and her husband, Dr. Joseph Roncaioli, seemed to have a perfect life. He had a good salary, and they showed themselves pretty happy when in the company of others. However, Ibi suffered from alcoholism, and they were not even sleeping together anymore. When she won the Lotto 6/49 jackpot of $5 million in 1991, things did not improve.
She died twelve years later, in 2003, and her husband was found guilty. The reason behind the murder was the fact that she illegally transferred all the winnings to her possession and then to her children.
How to Know If the Lottery Winners Stories are Real?
Most of the most exciting lottery winners stories are spread all over the internet, being easy to find in reputable news portals. Their existence alone works as an inspiration. However, if you always feel curious about figuring out if they are real or not, there is one way to check that out:
- Get the date of the drawing, not the prize claiming date.
- Find the information on the winning numbers and prizes on the lottery results.
- Compare them with those found in the stories.
- If they match, there is a big chance that the story is real.
- In the case that the anonymity was not preserved, open the official lottery site.
- Among the names of the winners, check if all the data above matches.
How to Become a Lottery Winner Too?
The exciting lottery winners stories revealed cases from all around the globe. You need to play the lottery in order to claim the lottery prize that will change your life. The best way to do it nowadays, thanks to the internet and the quality service of some websites, is to play it online.
As long as you are playing from a country that does not forbid lottery games, you will have access to lotteries in the US, in the United Kingdom, all across the European territory, and many other local games. All that you need to do is to choose one or more of the best lottery sites to start playing.
Remember that when lady luck visits you, it might be necessary to claim prizes in person if you are playing via a lottery agent. Otherwise, by using a lottery betting site, you can play from abroad and receive the prize directly to your account.
The Best Tips from Real Lottery Winners
We have our own page with a guide on how to play the lottery and win. Here, we will disclose tips from real lottery winners without judging their ideas. After all, they have won considerable amounts playing the lottery.
Richard Lustig
One of the featured winners of our most exciting lottery winners stories disclosed some tips for future lottery winners:
- Buy more tickets to improve your odds of winning.
- Prefer to play in a lottery syndicate to have more money for tickets.
- Keep away from consecutive numbers.
- Do not choose numbers within the same group or with a similar ending digit.
- Play unpopular games more than popular ones.
- Choose lottery games with fewer players to reduce the competition.
- Do not play with birthday dates or any dates at all.
- Understand that every number has similar odds of appearing.
Tips From Three Powerball Winners
- Take some time to claim the prize and decide what you will do next.
- Find legal and fiscal representation with professionals.
- Protect your privacy at all costs.
- Do not make extraordinary changes in your life.
- Prepare your mind for what may come in terms of emotional impact.
