10. Asking somebody else to claim the prize – Jose Antonio Cua-Toc, $750,000
Hitting the jackpot is every person’s dream. Imagine the things you can do and the things you can buy with all the money. Though Jessie J once sang that “it’s not about the money”, deep in your heart, you know that money can help buy you happiness and improve your life.
Which is why, despite all the odds against winning the jackpot, many will still line up and bet their luckiest numbers for a chance to win millions of dollars. After all, even if mathematicians calculate that the odds of winning can be as low as one in 171 million, you know that someone is bound to win sooner or later. So why can’t you be that one?
If you are really feeling lucky, try to bet on Spain’s Christmas lottery. Called the Sorteo Extraordinario de Navidad, its jackpot prize last year reached $941.8 million. That’s just a few million short of being included in the Forbes’ list of billionaires.
Of course, after hitting the jackpot, make sure that you are in the correct mind set in order to sustain yourself for the rest of your life, financially. Don’t do dumb things like what some winners have done through the years. Here is a list of the top 10 stupidest things people have done after hitting the jackpot.
Jose Antonio Cua-Toc is a Guatemalan native who had been staying illegally in the United States. He couldn’t believe his luck when he won a lottery in Georgia. He feared however that his undocumented status might prevent him from claiming his prize. So he asked his employer, Erick Cervantes, to get the money for him. Cervantes then took home the money, saying that it was his ticket and that Cua-Toc merely bought it for him. The two are now battling it out in court.