Lottery player uses ‘lucky penny’ found in parking lot to scratch ticket — and wins big

Timothy Clougherty picked up a penny in a parking lot after buying a Virginia lottery ticket, then used the coin to scratch it.

He won big.

The Accomack County man hit a top prize of $1,028,000 in the $10,000 a Month game, the Virginia Lottery said in a May 20 news release.

Lottery officials said he took his “lucky penny” home to scratch the lottery ticket, which won him the first of three top prizes available in the game.

The odds of hitting the jackpot in the game are 1-in-612,000, according to the Virginia Lottery. Two more top prizes, as well as an array of smaller wins, remain in the scratch-off game.

Clougherty opted to take the one-time lump sum of roughly $1 million before taxes rather than the namesake $10,000 a month over 10 years, lottery officials said.

“It took a week to really start sinking in,” he told lottery officials when he claimed his prize.

Accomack County is on the peninsula containing the Eastern Shore of Virginia, about an 80-mile drive north from Virginia Beach.

This story was originally published May 20, 2024 at 11:35 AM with the headline "Lottery player uses ‘lucky penny’ found in parking lot to scratch ticket — and wins big."