A man from San Luis Obispo County won $5 million on a scratcher ticket in August. The California Lottery has released his name, but not much else about him: John Clyde Stokely. The person who won the scratcher at the Cambria General Store on August 9 is “extraordinarily private,” according to Carolyn Becker, a spokesperson for the lottery.
The reporter called Becker on Friday and said, “Stokely doesn’t want anything to do with being in the public eye.” As required by state law, the lottery rules say that the winner’s name, when and where he bought the ticket, and the amount of the prize must be made public.
Becker told Stokely that he was free to hide information about his hometown and other important facts. Becker said that telling Stokely’s name took longer than if he had won a big prize in a regular lottery because it takes longer to check that a scratcher claim is real.
From August to September, she told The Tribune that scratchers are bought right at the store counter, just like any other item. It is unknown who bought which ticket from the seller. For this reason, the government must verify that a victory is real.
Becker said that the California Lottery needs to let everyone know about any win of $1 million or more. According to her, the system “handles more than 10,000 prize claims a month,” and every year there are about 120 wins of $1 million or more. “Doing that is just funny.”
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‘It’s Just a Funny Thing to Do.’ the Winner Shares How He Won a $5 Million Scratcher
Better said Stokely told lottery officials they could share his first thoughts about the win, even though he wanted to keep personal information private. As she put it, Stokely had been playing many California Lottery Scratchers games for many years in an effort to win big.
“When number 28 on his 100x game matched the top prize of $5 million, all that hard work paid off.” Stokely told the authorities, “Of course I was excited.” “While driving, I had to look at it several times to make sure I wasn’t seeing 26 instead of 28.”
It gave me the confidence I needed, so I looked at it many times at home, too, he said. “I won!” The quiet winner also told the officials about his “unique way of playing every time he buys a ticket,” according to Becker. To see if he has a match, he first scratches the numbers.
She told him that if he didn’t, he wouldn’t even void the prize. Becker said, “In this case, he had a 38 that matched.” He was aware that he had won something, but he wasn’t sure how much right away. The prize was a huge $5 million, which he didn’t say until later.
Investigators asked Stokely if he thought he was superstitious. His words were, “It’s just a funny thing to do.” “It makes no sense.” All of them are played that way. There’s just something strange about it that makes it more exciting. It was also his lucky day, he said.
Winning ticket provides a windfall for Cambria store owners
The Cambria General Store also had a really good day. As a reward for selling the lucky ticket, Becker said the general store would get $25,000. Since August 1, Benan Akkare and Elia Akhri have owned the store together. Updating the old building, which needs some love, has been going on since then.
People in San Luis Obispo County think this is the longest-running service station. Tuesday, Akkare said, “Cambria deserves better.” He said that the lottery bonus “will come in handy, but it’s probably only a small part” of what it costs to fix up the old building.
“We’re fixing up the parking lot, adding new flooring and counters, fixing the canopy to make it look better, and adding two new gas pumps that will take credit cards,” he said. Getting more food in is another thing we’re working on. According to shop manager Sean Farhoud, who sold the mega-winning ticket, he doesn’t think he will get any extra money for it.
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