Man uses $100 he won playing NC lottery to buy more tickets — and wins much bigger prize
A North Carolina man turned a smaller lottery prize into a much bigger one.
Alex Koonce walked to the Harris Teeter on West Barbee Chapel Road in Chapel Hill on Saturday and bought a GOLD scratch-off lottery ticket for $5, according to a release from the North Carolina Education Lottery.
“I was going to use the $100 I’d won the night before — to get more tickets,” Koonce told lottery officials.
He scratched the tickets on his way home and didn’t realize that he had won $200,000, the release says.
Koonce told lottery officials he didn’t know he “had a winner” until he scanned the ticket with his lottery app and instead of telling him how much he won, the app told him to go to lottery headquarters.
He then signed the back of the ticket and kept it safe until Monday, the release says.
“Once you sign it, it’s really only of value to you,” he told lottery officials.
The data science consultant has only been playing the lottery for about six weeks, according to the release.
He told lottery officials he plans to use the money to pay of his car and credit card bills and invest the rest.
This story was originally published January 28, 2020 at 6:40 PM with the headline "Man uses $100 he won playing NC lottery to buy more tickets — and wins much bigger prize."
