CRANSTON, R.I. — An
81-year-old woman from Newport won last month’s $336.4 million
Powerball jackpot, sleeping with the winning ticket in her Bible until
coming forward to claim the sixth-largest U.S. prize on Tuesday, a
family representative said.
At a news conference at state lottery headquarters in Cranston, Louise
White said little, calling herself “very happy” and “very proud.”
( Stew Milne / Associated Press ) - Louise White, right, 81 from
Newport, R.I., is presented a check for $336 million by Gerald Aubin,
left, director of the state’s lottery, and Gov. Lincoln Chafee, center,
at Rhode Island Lottery headquarters in Cranston, R.I., Tuesday, March
6, 2012. White won last month’s $336.4 million Powerball jackpot,
sleeping with the winning ticket in her Bible until coming forward to
claim the sixth-largest U.S. prize on Tuesday, a family representative
said.
Her attorneys said she was a regular lottery player who bought the
winning ticket at a Stop & Shop supermarket in Newport where she
had stopped for rainbow sherbet. The ticket is being claimed in the
name of the Rainbow Sherbet Trust.
White kept the winning ticket in a Bible after she realized she won.
The winning ticket was among three tickets with random numbers
purchased on a $9 wager, officials said.
“It was unbelievable,” White said in a statement released Tuesday
by her attorneys. “None of us can believe it yet. We’re excited, very
blessed and will determine in the coming months how we’ll spend the
money but we know we’ll always have rainbow sherbet.”
White said she wrote down the numbers when they were read on television
after the drawing, but missed a few — so she waited 10 minutes to hear
them again. She didn’t check her ticket immediately.
When she did, each of the numbers was the same. “Is anybody awake — I
want you to come look at something,” she yelled.
Not believing she was the winner, she said, she checked the numbers
online. Still the same.
“We still didn’t believe it, so we turned off the computer and
turned it back on and went back to the website and my numbers were
still there,” White said in the statement. “We hugged each other and
jumped up and down screaming!! ... We hid the ticket in the Bible and
went for breakfast on Sunday since we couldn’t do anything with it.”
The Newport Daily News reported that White lives with her son, LeRoy
White, a local musician, and his wife, Deborah, a surgical nurse at
Newport Hospital, on the seaside city’s south side. LeRoy White is
listed as a member of the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts.
Louise White will take a lump sum payment of $210 million, the highest
ever for Powerball, officials said. The jackpot was the third largest
in Powerball history and the largest ever won in Rhode Island,
officials said.
The top lottery jackpot in U.S. history was a $390 million Mega
Millions prize won in March 2007.
The Powerball jackpot win is the first since the ticket price increased
from $1 to $2 in January. Rising sales nearly doubled the jackpot from
$173.5 million on Feb. 1.
There is no bonus for the supermarket for selling the winning ticket,
officials said. Instead of paying out a bonus, Powerball retailers in
Rhode Island get eight cents on the dollar for every ticket sold.
Rhode Island will get about $14.7 million in taxes on the prize in a
lump-sum payment, lottery officials said Tuesday.
Powerball is played in 42 states, Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Virgin
Islands. The chance of matching all five numbers and the Powerball
number is about 1 in 175 million.
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