Powerball jackpot winner claims $758m and immediately quits job
The woman who won the second-largest lottery prize in US history says she isn’t going back to work, and kind of wants to spend some alone.
Mavis Wanczyk was the only winner this week, and said that she was initially shocked to realise she’d won.
“Last night, it was kind of like — I didn’t realise I had won,” she said in a news conference.
She smiled during that appearance, and stood next to a giant check with “PAY TO THE ORDER OF: Mavis L. Wanczyk” written on it alongside the same she was about to take home: $758,700,000.
“Now, it’s like — I am a winner, and I’m scared. But I’ll be okay,” she said. “I had a pipe dream, and my pipe dream finally came true.”
Ms Wanczyk has worked for Mercy Medical Centre in Massachusetts for 32 years, and was hoping to retire early. She can certainly do that now.
She said that now she just wants to “be alone and just be able to be me.”
Ms Wanczyk said that she regularly plays the lottery, and that she bought two quick-pick tickets in her home town of Chicopee. She then chose the winning numbers on a separate ticket. She said that the five number she chose came to her from family birthdays, and other significant numbers.
She will take home around $443 million when all is said and done, depending on state taxes. She can either choose to receive the money all at once, or in yearly payments over 29 years.
