Lucky for six lifetimes
By Kate Northrop
Most lottery players would be fortunate enough to walk away with one Lucky for Life prize of $25,000 a year for life, but a Massachusetts man was lucky enough to manifest that coveted prize six times over.
Raymond Roberts Sr. of Fall River won the second-tier Lucky for Life prize of $25,000 a year for life six times in the same drawing.
On Wed., Dec. 14, Roberts matched the first five numbers on his six tickets to earn him the multi-state game's second-tier prize. The winning numbers were 2, 4, 6, 17, and 20, with Lucky Ball 5.
Had he matched the Lucky Ball number, he would have won the game's top prize of $7,000 a week for life.
The Vietnam veteran told the Lottery that his choice to buy six identical tickets for one drawing was simply thanks to "intuition." The numbers, he explained, are a combination of anniversary dates and birthdays that he had been playing in various draw games for more than 20 years.
He wasted no time to collect his prizes. The day after the drawing, he showed up at Lottery headquarters in Dorchester. Although he won six prizes with the same numbers, the way he claimed them was unique.
Roberts claimed five of the prizes as the $390,000 cash option for a total of $1.95 million before taxes. For the sixth prize, he opted for the annuity option, which awarded him the first annual payment of $25,000 before taxes from a minimum of 20 annual payments.
The winner plans on using a portion of the winnings to purchase a motorcycle.
Royal Liquors on N. Main Street in Fall River, the store that sold all six tickets, will receive a $30,000 bonus, or $5,000 for each winning ticket, from the Lottery.
Lucky for Life drawings take place every day at 10:38pm EST. Tickets cost $2 each. The winning numbers and prize amounts can be found on Lottery Post's Multi-State Lottery Results page.
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Interesting that he took the last prize as an annuity. He's got to be in his 70's being a Vietnam Veteran.
Anyway congratulations to you my Comrade in arms!
Raymond you sure showed the Connecticut lottery a thing or two about their Lucky for Life lottery (where it is RNG drawn) and a very nice early Christmas gift!
I am so very happy for this veteran. Playing the exact same numbers for over 20 years and never winning the big money had to be very frustrating, but he stuck with it, and it paid off, big time. Thank you for your service sir, and enjoy your new Xmas bike.
Wow. For some reason I thought one winner could not win multiple for life prizes but this was the second place so it does make sense.
At his age, he probably took the annuity for one of the wins due to a guaranteed minimum payout of 20 years so a relative would receive it if he dies.
Remember all payouts over time go to those in your will or heirs through probate. They continue to collect the balance.
I don't remember what the exact rules say but if you read them they say that up to about twenty tickets can win second prize and then after that they split a fixed non annuity jackpot amount. There is something similar for the top prize.
I am unclear if he bought 6 tickets with the same lucky ball...that isn't too smart because if he got six different lucky balls he would have increased his chances of hitting first prize.
what's the difference what he took? no one knows his situation.
Fun Fact:
The Borden home is in Fall River.
Lizzie Borden took an axe, and gave her Mother 40 whacks. When she saw what she had done, she gave her Father 41!
She was acquitted of all charges.
To this day that is known as a haunted B & B.
Kate, no disrespect as I love your website, but you need to do a little fact-finding on the "for Life" games. Whether it's "Cash for Life" or "Lucky for Life", if more than one ticket is sold matching all 5 balls plus the "Cash" or "Lucky" ball, the top prize is divided equally amongst all winning tickets. While I did not dig too deep into the Lucky for Life rules, the same applies to Cash for Life players matching 5 numbers- once more than 7 people match 5 numbers, the prize becomes pari-mutuel. TNWinner posts the exact same 10 sets of Cash for Life numbers every day from what I see on the FL predictions page and if she ever hits 5 numbers plus the Cash ball, will only get $7,000,000. Better off to play as many "cash" or "lucky" balls as you can and hit the 1st prize and multiple 2nd prizes. Too bad our lucky veteran was ignorant to these rules or he might have pocketed the top prize.
I am not seeing what the inaccuracy is here. The winner had 6 -2nd place tickets so I am assuming he was the only second place winner. Were there other 2nd place winners?
And isn't it standard for the top prize to be shared in the major jp games if there is more than one winner, whether it is pb, mm, lucky for life, etc?
Rules state for winners 1-20 each get the $25K/life prize; after 21 it goes down. So if he had 14 more secondary prize tickets the payout for him would've been the same.
The Virginia lottery website states that 2nd prize cash for life can have up to 14 winners before it is reallocated.
Maybe different states have different rules for Lucky For Life?
I was looking at Oklahomas lottery website and they didn't seem to have much in-depth info on there for this game.
I agree but none of these things were relevant or affected the accuracy of the article.
I wasn't disputing the fact that he had 6 2nd place tickets, only that by playing 6 identical tickets with the same Lucky Ball (instead of choosing 6 different Lucky Balls, thereby increasing his odds of winning the top prize sixfold) he got the same result- 6 2nd place tickets. Kate stated that - had he had the Lucky Ball correct- he would have had 6 tickets worth $7 million each. Simply incorrect.
Perhaps the best strategy would have been to contact her directly and privately and provided her a chance to correct the error vs telling her she needs to do a little fact finding and playing gotcha.
They will only pay ONE ticket holder the top prize; players 2-14 get the top prize split among them. He would've still had a nice pay day on tickets 2-6 however like all L4L prizes they are pari-mutuel.
Now you guys make me want to look up C4L prize payouts.
The story has been updated to reflect the correct top prize structure. Thank you for pointing out the error.
kate northrup areticle on lucky life winner the bonus number is wrong it was 5 and not 6
Not sure if anyone before has won multiple secondary prizes on games with cash or payment options so no precedent. It's a unique way of taking the winnings.
Congrats Raymond, enjoy !
I have actually played this way many times before but didnt win anything. I have bought 12 and 15 Lucky Balls with the same set of 5 numbers and still didn't win even on the lucky ball! I have done 12 lucky balls several times (2 to 1 in my favor) and never got even the Lucky Ball.
If you buy the same 5 numbers with 5 different Lucky Balls the cash prize is obviously $1,950,000 with 1.8 million to 1 odds.
The cost is 10 bux and the odds are as good or better than Michigan scratchers and you win more lump sum cash than you would on every Michigan scratcher except the $5 and $10 Cash for Life and the $30 and $50 scratchers. The $1.95 Million is even more than has ever been awarded on the Club games, the web(internet) games and also more than has ever been awarded on the Michigan Fast Cash games! $10 bux on the Lucky for Life here in Michigan is one of the better ways to drop 10 bux if you go for the prize vs odds. I don't understand why more people in Michigan have not tried it.
Personally though I have had more luck with just getting two or three tickets with different lucky balls.