Farm Worker Forgets Ticket As He Travels By Limo To Collect Lotto Jackpot
Last Updated: Tuesday 7th July 2020, 17:18 pm
A farmer from Donegal had the perfect night planned as he set off to claim his Irish Lotto winnings in a stretch limo, before realising that he did not have his ticket with him. Odhran Doherty put the embarrassing moment behind him to pick up his winnings, and is now looking forward to starting life as a millionaire.
Doherty won the €1 million jackpot in Saturday night’s Irish Lotto Plus 1 draw, having been given a ticket by his father as a little gift after a hard day’s work on the family farm in The Glebe in Letterkenny. The entry had been bought at Barclay’s Newsagents in Raphoe.
The family hired a Hummer limo to go to Dublin’s National Lottery headquarters in style, only to have to turn round after ten miles to retrieve the ticket from home. Odhran said: “My father put it in a safe place, a wee bit too safe now to be honest. We were in Raphoe, near where we got the bloody thing. But it wasn't too bad, we were only in Raphoe so we got it back and it was alright.”
Odhran, 23, does not think his big win will sink in for a while and he will not rush into making any major decisions about the future, but he already has a few ideas. He is thinking about getting a new Massey Ferguson tractor for the farm, and wants to take the family on a skiing trip. Mum Margaret also hopes to visit New York to do some clothes shopping.
“I can’t even describe it in words - it is amazing,” said Odhran about his seven-figure windfall. “We will have a think how we will spend it and let it settle.” One decision that he has already made is that he wants to keep working on the farm, insisting that he likes it too much and the ‘lambing never stops’.
Dad Liam also revealed that the timing of his son’s big win made it even harder to believe that it had actually happened. He explained: “I thought it was April Fool's. He rang me and he says, 'get down here'. I still thought it was a bit of a joke. I says 'What the heck do you want me down for?' and he says 'get down here I think there's something up' and I landed down and he came out of the pub and said 'I won a million quid!'"
Dermot Griffin To Step Down
The Irish Lotto Plus games, which include Plus 1, Plus 2 and the Lotto Plus Raffle, provide you with extra chances to win when you play the main game. You just have to opt in and pay a small additional fee. The games were revamped last September to offer bigger prizes than had previously been the case, and the changes helped the National Lottery to generate more than €800 million last year for the first time in a decade.
National Lottery CEO Dermot Griffin, a key figure in picking up those sales, has now announced that he is to step down from his post after 14 years in charge. Having also helped the National Lottery to raise more than €3.2 billion for good causes during his tenure, Griffin has been thanked for his work.
A statement said: “Griffin has been responsible for many significant developments including the introduction of the National Lottery Star logo; the development of online and mobile lottery services; the revamping of all lottery games and the extension of the retail network.”
Griffin, who will continue to support the business in an advisory capacity, said: “It has been a privilege to lead the National Lottery for the last 14 years during a period of continuous development in all aspects of the business, including the change in ownership from public to private.”
Premier Lotteries Ireland (PLI) will now begin the process of looking for a new chief executive, and have hired Barry Herriott of consulting firm Korn Ferry to assist in the search.
