Trucker had ‘lucky feeling’ before buying NC lottery ticket. His hunch paid off big
A truck driver had a “lucky feeling” that led to a jackpot win in North Carolina.
Jeffrey Coleman is celebrating a big prize after he followed his instinct to play the Lucky for Life game, the N.C. Education Lottery said Tuesday in a news release.
“I don’t normally play Lucky For Life,” he said in the release. “I just happened to buy three tickets right before the drawing closed – lucky feeling, I guess.”
It was Christmas morning when Coleman saw an email telling him one of his tickets was worth $25,000 a year.
“I didn’t believe it at first,” he told lottery officials. “I thought maybe it was a mistake, so I logged off my account and went about my day.”
It turns out, the email was the real deal.
Officials say his $2 ticket matched enough numbers to score a top prize in the Lucky for Life drawing. Coleman had beat 1-in-1.8 million odds to win.
Coleman chose to take his winnings in a lump sum and kept $275,926 after taxes. He said he plans to invest and save the prize money, according to the N.C. Education Lottery.
Officials say Coleman is from Thomasville, a city in Davidson County roughly 25 miles southwest of downtown Greensboro.
Coleman wasn’t the only lottery player to get a windfall just in time for the holiday season.
In North Carolina, a grandmother who won big last week planned to put her prize money toward a new home, McClatchy News reported.
And in South Carolina, thousands of people recently won prizes in the Pick 3 game. The players had all chosen the number combination 3-3-3, the same sequence picked in the Dec. 19 drawing.
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MOREWhen gambling is more than a game
Gambling is designed to be a source of entertainment.
If you or a loved one shows signs of gambling addiction, you can seek help by calling the national gambling hotline at 1-800-522-4700 or visiting the National Council on Problem Gambling website.
This story was originally published December 31, 2020 at 4:13 PM with the headline "Trucker had ‘lucky feeling’ before buying NC lottery ticket. His hunch paid off big."
