He owns $8.9 million and doesn't know

Wilbur Brown bought a lottery ticket on Christmas Eve without seeming high hopes, prompting him to forget about it, only to discover three months later that he had $8.9 million.

According to Complex magazine, citing the Oregon lottery site, Brown bought an Oregon Megabucks ticket "26 for $25" last year, allowing him to enter 26 consecutive Megabucks draws (a special lottery drawing).

The ticket eventually covered the draws from December 25, 2021 to February 19, but the man had forgotten to keep track of these draws, leaving the card in his wallet all that time.

Suddenly in February the man remembered his ticket and scanned it at the lottery ticket self-checking station, only to be greeted with a message telling him to speak with customer service, a message that often signifies good news.

When she was checked again, a message appeared that read, verbatim, declaring that he was a "big lottery winner".

Until then, Brown had no idea how much he had earned, until his friends helped him check the results and revealed how much he had earned.

Instead of choosing to receive all of his winnings at once according to the US lottery system, Brown said he chose the 30-year annuity option so he could make just over $200,000 each year.

In a similar incident in January, a Michigan woman accidentally discovered she had won a $4 million Mega Millions prize after checking her spam folder, the magazine reported.

"I was looking for a missing email from someone, so I checked the spam folder in my email account," said 55-year-old Laura Spears. "This is when I saw an email from the lottery saying I won a prize."

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