Fla. Woman, 84, Claims $590M Powerball Jackpot
Source: AP-ABC
By BRENT KALLESTAD
An 84-year-old Florida woman who bought her Powerball ticket after another customer let her get ahead in line came forward Wednesday to claim the biggest undivided lottery jackpot in history: $590 million.
Gloria C. MacKenzie, who lives in a modest, tin-roof house in Zephyrhills, where the sole winning ticket in the May 18 drawing was bought, took her prize in a lump sum of just over $370 million. After federal taxes, she is taking home about $270 million, lottery officials said.
She did not speak to a crowd of reporters outside lottery headquarters, leaving quickly in a silver Ford Focus with her son and family friends. She was accompanied at the lottery offices by two unidentified attorneys.
MacKenzie bought the winning ticket at a Publix supermarket in the town of about 13,300 people 30 miles northeast of Tampa. It is best known for the bottled spring water that bears its name and now, for one of the biggest lottery winners of all time.
FULL story and video at link.
Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/590-million-powerball-jackpot-claimed-fla-19331093#.Ua-zN9iwUcs
Kingofalldems
(38,458 posts)Sunlei
(22,651 posts)KinMd
(966 posts)nolabear
(41,984 posts)No?
DWinNJ
(261 posts)Don't think I'm letting any little old ladies cut in front of me
Isn't that the shit. You be nice and let some old lady go ahead of you and then find out she won. I wonder if the old woman thinks about the person who let her go first. What a thing to have to think about, being the person who let her go ahead of them.
NJCher
(35,675 posts)She'll find out who that nice person was and grace them some millions.
And if the person had a record for letting the machine pick the numbers, she should then consider giving the person half.
I know. Easy for me to say. But I think I might do that. Either that or just donate 90 per cent of it to shelters that care for abused animals.
Cher
zonkers
(5,865 posts)popped out the same numbers for the person who let her go ahead of them.
itsrobert
(14,157 posts)will spit out different numbers because the amount of tickets being produces nationwide. Those numbers could have been mine in California if the guy didn't let her cut ahead.
Faygo Kid
(21,478 posts)Remember how I would always hang with your son, Spuds?
He was a party animal, that one.
Thor_MN
(11,843 posts)AdHocSolver
(2,561 posts)...shows how morally corrupt our culture is.
Having a top prize of $500,000 would provide for 1,180 winners and spread the wealth around and improve the odds of winning for all those who bought tickets.
Economically, such a huge prize for one individual is equivalent to the vulture capitalist who buys a company, sells off the assets, fires the employees, and walks away with a half-a-billion dollars.
brooklynite
(94,584 posts)Or just shut them down?
AdHocSolver
(2,561 posts)A bigger criticism of Las Vegas is the waste of natural resources and the pollution created by placing the lavish surroundings in a desert environment.
friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)Granted, the various state lotteries rake off 50% of sales...
DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)Earth_First
(14,910 posts)wins, and the outcome of her new found wealth is still to be determined.
P.S. you suck at analogies
AdHocSolver
(2,561 posts)Jenoch
(7,720 posts)woyld lke them to, and not because they have not tried. There alk kinds of lottery ganes where a single winner wins a million bucks instead of hundreds of millions. Those games attract few players. Did YOU play those kinds of lottery games?
MrSlayer
(22,143 posts)I'll win but I'll be too old for it to matter.
iandhr
(6,852 posts)... who let let skip in line ahed of her.
DRoseDARs
(6,810 posts)roamer65
(36,745 posts)Sounds like she cut in line in from of a mother and daughter. From what I have read, the clerk said the mother and daughter were next, but the mother and daughter were polite and said go ahead and help her first. Lets see if this human has it in her heart to extend the kindness back to the mother and daughter.
madville
(7,410 posts)With "quick picks" the numbers are randomly generated at the time the clerk pushes the button. One microsecond either way and the winning numbers aren't generated.
If they were quick picks the mother and daughter would have no claim because if they hadn't let her cut in line they wouldn't have won anyway since the exact timing would not be the same and different numbers would have been generated.
If the winner had a bubble card filled in with numbers she had personally picked it doesn't matter where she went in line anyway since she would have picked the same numbers whether she was first or last.
Codeine
(25,586 posts)their kindness didn't have any effect on her win -- her numbers were her numbers.
flamingdem
(39,313 posts)It is kinda corrupt in that Americana Way but let's enjoy what this woman is feeling. The good part seems to be that she is relatively stable, from what we've seen, and she was living in a very humble way.
Good for her.
olddots
(10,237 posts)" hey I got mine fuck you "
I too think that these mega jackpots are like our lack of civility and sounds like this will get very ugly like a lot of these big pay offs.