Woman Wins $55.1-Million Record Fla. Lotto Jackpot

A 63-year-old woman from Winter Springs today claimed the North American record $55.1-million Florida Lotto jackpot, just hours after officials rejected a school janitor’s claim he had the sole winning ticket.

Sheelah Ryan said she sat down Friday morning and picked the six lucky numbers by looking for the first six numbers that appeared in her local newspaper: 3, 27, 19, 35, 20 and 5. She then walked into a store and bought $5 in tickets.

Ryan said she previously bought $4 worth of tickets a week but upped the ante when the jackpot exceeded $20 million.

“I sat holding my head in my hands for about an hour saying, ‘Oh, my god,’ ” Ryan said.

“I’ve had three firsts today,” she said. “It was my first plane ride; second, this is my first press conference, and No. 3, I’ve never won $55.1 million before.”

Ryan said she doesn’t know what she’ll do with her winnings and is unsure whether she will quit her job.

‘Always ... Middle Class’

“I’ve always been middle class, and the middle class always needs money,” she said.

Ryan, a native New Yorker, said she is single and has no children.

Earlier, lottery officials inspected a copy of a ticket submitted by janitor Charles Hill, but in a statement they said, “We have denied Mr. Hill’s claim based on the fact that he did not have the original of his ticket.”

“The lottery verification procedures on the copy provided by Mr. Hill indicate that he does not have the winning ticket,” the statement said.

Hill, a high school janitor, had already gone on a $42,000 buying spree and claims that he has the ticket locked in a Sheriff’s Department vault. Hill is from Bristol in the Florida Panhandle, 280 miles from the central Florida town of Longwood where lottery officials say the winning ticket was purchased.

Lottery officials also said the sequence of numbers on Hill’s ticket varies from the normal sequence on Lotto tickets.

Car Dealers Convinced

Hill acted like the winner during the Labor Day weekend. He bought two Chevrolet vans without cash and used the sheriff to vouch for him. One cost $19,000 and the other $23,000.

Tommy Thomas of Panama City and Jim Robinson of Blountstown, two car dealers each of whom had vans delivered to Hill on Labor Day, said they were convinced that he was the winner.

The jackpot’s final value was put at $55.16 million, which breaks down into 20 annual payments of $2.76 million before taxes.