Mom won $4M in NC lottery — but her kids weren’t so sure. ‘None of them believed me’
A North Carolina mom scored a $4 million lottery prize — but her kids weren’t so convinced.
“I called my children and my mom but none of them believed me,” Tina Hansley told the N.C. Education Lottery.
The win was the real deal, and it came after Hansley tried her luck on a $30 scratch-off ticket for the Black Titanium game. She had been playing the game since it launched in June 2023.
“There’s always a chance,” Hansley told lottery officials in a Nov. 1 news release. “You just never know so you try and see what happens.”
This time around, Hansley bought her lucky ticket at the Yaya Mini Mart in Currie, a roughly 25-mile drive northwest from Wilmington.
The big win left her seeking a second opinion.
“I asked the girl in the store to look at it to make sure I was looking at it right,” Hansley said. “Then I tried to settle down. I was shocked.”
The jackpot winner, who is also from Currie, opted out of annual payments and instead chose to take her prize as a lump sum of $2.4 million. She kept about $1.7 million after taxes.
It’s not the first time a lottery winner’s family members have been in disbelief. Another North Carolina woman had to send a screenshot to her daughters after she hit the jackpot, McClatchy News reported in October.
This story was originally published November 4, 2024 at 9:38 AM with the headline "Mom won $4M in NC lottery — but her kids weren’t so sure. ‘None of them believed me’."
