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DC man almost lost half of his $1M win!

Lost and then found!

Phillip H. with his $500,000 Lucky for Life check.
Phillip H. with his $500,000 Lucky for Life check. Photograph credit to the District of Columbia Lottery.
Todd Betzold

One very lucky player in Washington, D.C., found himself in quite a predicament when he couldn't find one of his $500,000 winning Lucky for Life tickets. After a month of searching, it was found, and he can breathe a sigh of relief.

A stressful time

For the August 12 Lucky for Life drawing, Phillip H. purchased two tickets. Both of those tickets matched the five winning white ball numbers to score the game's $25,000 a year for life prize. However, he couldn't find one of the tickets, so he was feeling a little stressed out!

The winning white ball numbers for the August 12 drawing were 3, 6, 17, 24, and 35, and the Lucky Ball was 2. Each of the winning tickets had a cash value of $500,000, and combined, the tickets totaled a potential windfall of $1,000,000.

The 57-year-old environmental volunteer told lottery officials:

I always get two tickets, and I always pick my own numbers. That's my winning strategy. I saw that the first ticket was a winner but couldn't find the other ticket.

Patience paid off

Since he had one winning ticket in his hands, Phillip claimed that first Lucky for Life win right away at the DC Lottery's Prize Center.

Patience paid off though for Phillip, because over a month later he returned to the prize center and had that second winning ticket in his hand!

He told lottery officials, “After searching through old tickets, I found it and let out a big sigh of relief.”

The winning tickets were purchased at Anacostia Mobil, located in Southeast D.C.

Now that he has both prizes in his possession, the lucky player said he plans on tackling a list of home improvement projects and buying a new truck to help with his volunteer efforts.

Lucky for Life is a daily draw game available in the District of Columbia, as well as 22 other states. Tickets cost $2 per play and prizes range from $3 up to the top prize, which is $1,000 a day for life.

'Quad' wins in D.C.

While Phillip was celebrating a double win in the Lucky for Life game, plenty of other players were recently celebrating back-to-back “quad” wins for the DC 4 game!

On September 23, DC Lottery players won a combined $1.24 million playing the DC 4 Evening drawing. The winning numbers for that drawing were 2-2-2-2 and there were about 342 winning tickets sold for that drawing.

That happened to be the second night in a row for quad numbers, because the Night DC 4 drawing on September 22 was 8-8-8-8. There were 232 tickets that won during that draw, which resulted in $1.07 million in winnings, a record that only lasted one day!

The $1.07 million was the highest payout for DC 4, but that record lasted one day when the next night, the DC Lottery paid out $1.24 million.

Enjoy playing the DC Lottery, and please remember to play responsibly.

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