Solid waste employees “clean up” with $1 million Mega Millions prize

Drawing Date: 7/15/2014

July 16, 2014 - Employees at Waste Municipal Utilities are usually concerned with making sure their customers’ trash is picked up. Today turned out to be quite different for four coworkers. 

When John Stone of Winchester, Ky., showed up to work this morning he told Carrie Taylor of Winchester, who purchases lottery tickets for the group, that she’d better check their tickets because someone in Winchester had won $1 million. Later that morning she decided to get the Mega Millions tickets out to take a look. Her eyes immediately went to the last line on the ticket because the first number had matched the winning number. As she continued to check the numbers she discovered that they’d matched all of the first five numbers. “I had to put the ticket aside and call for John to come take a look,” she said. 

After John checked the numbers they felt confident that they were holding the winning ticket. Next, they began to notify everyone else in the group. 

David Fultz of Denniston was offsite when he got the call from Carrie. “I didn’t know what to think. She sounded crazy and told me to call her as soon as I could,” David said.

While they hadn’t told anyone about their win, their coworkers were beginning to figure it out. “People were starting to get word that a ticket had been sold across the street but it wasn’t until the four of us left together that they suspected it was us,” John said.

All of their cell phones were blowing up with text messages while claiming their ticket at Kentucky Lottery headquarters. Many of them well wishes from coworkers.

“This is going to make everyone more comfortable,” John told lottery officials. “We all just want to be debt free,” everyone in the group agreed. Mike Howard of Winchester also said that he plans to take a vacation with some of his winnings. 

After splitting the prize, each person walked out of lottery headquarters with a check for $172,500 after taxes. 

The winning numbers for the July 15 drawing were  2 – 4 – 17 – 36 – 40, with a Mega Ball of 5.

The winning ticket was purchased at Shell Food Mart on West Washington Street in Winchester. The store will receive $10,000 for selling the winning ticket.