Four More Lottery Players Strike $2-Million Bonanza
A quartet of Californians--including a Mexican immigrant who speaks no English and a motorcycle-riding grandmother from Oxnard--became instant millionaires Monday as the new state lottery gave away more than $8 million in its second shriek-filled spinoff in Hollywood.
The Oxnard woman, a real estate agent, said she planned a busman’s holiday of property buying with her windfall, while another winner almost lost his chance at riches by partying too much in San Jose.
A third millionaire will thank the Almighty by buying a stained-glass window at the church his parents attend in Iowa. The fourth will spend it on his seven children.
The four millionaires were the first, fourth, fifth and seventh people in a field of 20 to step up to a giant, 100-slot wheel set up on a sound stage at Hollywood Center Studio. Each beat odds of 25 million to 1 to win the top jackpot prize.
All contestants were $100 instant game winners who had their names picked from a drum containing 6,249 other $100 winners.
The first big winner was Rose Marie Forsyth, a grandmother who sells real estate in Oxnard and likes to spend her off-hours riding to Las Vegas on a motorcycle.
“Oh, I can’t believe it!” Forsyth gasped as she first hugged game show host Chuck Woolery, then her husband. “Oh, my! Oh, my! Oh, my!” she repeated.
Forsyth said she will take a trip to Egypt and invest in property with her new fortune.
She won the $2 million on her second spin. The first spin was disqualified because the wheel--containing 40 slots with $10,000 prizes, 30 designating $50,000 awards, 20 with $100,000 slots and 10 for $2 million--did not go around the required three times.
Millionaire No. 2 was Jose Caballero, a 24-year-old furniture delivery man from San Jose. Caballero, a bachelor and a native of Michoacan, Mexico, answered reporters’ questions through an interpreter.
Asked what he intended to do with the money, Caballero repeated, “No se,” or “I don’t know.”
Several days earlier--on the night Caballero won the $100 that qualified him for the “Big Spin”--he went out with friends and had so many celebration cocktails that he lost the winning ticket. Caballero was in the midst of a frantic search when one of his friends found it and returned it to him.
Caballero also had to spin the wheel twice Monday after his first turn failed to go around three times. On the second spin, the little red ball bounced into the $2-million slot and soon Caballero was surrounded by his relatives, hugging him and talking excitedly.
The third $2-million winner Monday was James Smith, 51, a circuit board inspector from Pacoima, who invested $500 in lottery tickets trying to get to the “Big Spin.”
“I knew it. . . . I knew I would do it,” Smith exclaimed as the $2 million came up on the wheel. “I’ll tell you who I want to thank--everyone in California who voted for the lottery!”
Smith said he plans to use some of the money to install a window in the church where his parents worship in Independence, Iowa. “I made a little promise,” he said.
Smith also said he would pay off some outstanding bills. “I’m always a little late. This time I can pay them on time.”
The Pacoima man turned up at the spinning extravaganza wearing a green outfit, topped by a black top hat emblazoned with glittery shamrocks and a bright orange and green lottery button. He dubbed it his lucky “St. Paddy’s Day” outfit.
The final millionaire of the day was taciturn Harry Ney, 49, the father of seven children--two boys and five girls--who works for a can company in Modesto.
Twice a Winner
Lottery luck struck Ney twice in the past several days--he also won $5,000 on an instant “scratch-off” ticket.
Ney was reluctant to talk about his plans for the money, but finally admitted, “I have a couple of plans. . . . I’d like to get my wife, who manages a restaurant, to retire. And I’d like to get the ranch that my mother left when she passed away. And I’d like to go fishing.”
The lottery created its first millionaire last week when 38-year-old Linda Scott of Glencoe, in Calaveras County, won the $2-million prize in the initial field of 20 finalists.
Winning $100,000 Monday were Richard Miranda, 22, who works for a paving company in Baldwin Park and says he wants to buy a truck and a roller and open his own paving business; William Collins, 39, a contractor from Oxnard, who will share his winnings with his family and set up a trust for his granddaughter; Alfred (Lee) Evans, a 30-year-old Los Angeles bartender, who says he will buy more tickets with part of his winnings, and Kendall Byrd, an assistant city attorney in Long Beach.
When a lottery official called the city attorney’s office to tell Byrd he was a finalist, Byrd was out. So his co-workers decided to have a little fun. They cornered a local detective, and had him waiting for Byrd when he returned. Then they staged a mock arrest, complete with a reading of Byrd’s Miranda rights. “I thought some of my college activities had caught up with me. . . . I thought about the statute of limitations,” Byrd recalled. Then his co-workers burst into laughter and congratulated him.
Byrd says he will pay bills with his winnings.
The $50,000 winners Monday were Robin Rosar, 35, a secretary from San Jose; Don Sharp, 34, a mortgage banker from Oakdale; Guadalupe Lopez, 31, a baby sitter from Salinas; Rosa Fraga, a 19-year-old housewife from Tracy; Nicki Lopez (no relation to Guadalupe), a 30-year-old elementary school custodian from Long Beach, and Eva Julianus, 29, a clerk at a McDonald’s restaurant in Pacific.
Winners of $10,000, the minimum spinoff prize, were Joe McAlpin of Antioch, Naomi Garrison of Chino; Rosabelle Gold, San Francisco; Mazal Eytan, Los Angeles; Clyde Epps, Bakersfield, and Ivan Cox of Covina.
