What would you do if you won a lotto ticket amounting to $32 million? While you are thinking about it let see what Julie Cervera of San Bernardino, California has to do with her $32 million lotto wining.
In fact, first thing
come to her mind knowing she won the lotto ticket is to buy me a pair of Reeboks.
For more than five months — while Julie Cervera struggled to pay a $600
electrical bill, feed her family and keep the cable company from shutting off
her service because she couldn't pay — she was a millionaire without knowing
it.
Meanwhile, the California grandmother's $23-million lottery ticket languished forgotten in the glove compartment of her car.
- On Thursday, someone texted her a photo of her daughter, Charliena Marquez, buying the winning ticket for her at a Palmdale Liquor store. The photo had been released by lottery officials searching for the mysterious winner of the May drawing.
- "I put my 99-cent glasses on, and I had to put two pairs on to see it," said Cervera, 69, of Victorville. She recognized her daughter in the grainy photo, but she still couldn't read the caption.
- "I thought she robbed a bank because I couldn't see the words on top," Cervera said with a laugh. "So I put on a third pair [of glasses] and it said she won. I was like, 'No way!"'
- Back in May, mother and daughter were driving home together when Marquez felt queasy and asked her mother to pull over so she could buy a bottle of water.
- Cervera asked her daughter to buy her a lottery ticket and dug in her purse trying to find a dollar. Marquez protested but eventually used her own money to purchase a Super Lotto Plus ticket for her mom.
- "I put it in my new car. It's an old car but it's new to me. It's been there for five months," Cervera said Friday at a news conference with her three adult children and half a dozen grandchildren lined up behind her. "I've got like 200 tickets laying around my house. I never check my tickets."
But when she finally looked in the glove compartment, the winning ticket was
right where she left it. It was set to expire Nov. 26, so the California
Lottery went looking for the winner.
Officials found the surveillance video from Michael's Market and Liquor and released the photo, which Cervera's other daughter spotted in the Antelope Valley Press.
- Marquez initially dismissed calls and texts from friends and family who recognized her in the photo.
- It wasn't until the next morning that Marquez realized she had bought the winning ticket that would help her mother and her entire family for years to come.
- Cervera, a widow who has lived on disability for 20 years, said her family has been through difficult times recently. Last year her 47-year-old son Rudy was killed in a motorcycle accident, leaving four teenage children.
- "I'd give it all up to have my son here again," she said and began to cry. Her oldest grandson, Rudy Jr., hugged her and the whole family wiped away tears.
- "My grandkids are all going to be taken care of, and my [three] daughters," she said. "I'm just so happy. I'm going to buy me a pair of Reeboks."
Cervera had only 180 days to claim her prize. If she hadn't acted, the
millions would have gone to California schools. A $52-million jackpot winner in
Fremont was found in August by a similar public appeal by lottery officials.
Cervera said she would take a one-time cash payment of $17.8 million.
"I'm not going to be here 30 years from now," she said.
Source: CBC
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