A central Iowa man walked around for days without realizing he had a lottery ticket in his wallet had won a prize of $25,000 a year for life.
Brandon Richey of Dallas Center claimed his prize today at lottery headquarters in Clive. He says he generally waits to check his lottery tickets until he has a few to scan at a time.
So nearly a week after the Lucky for Life® drawing where he won at the game’s second prize level of $25,000 a week for life, he finally checked his ticket.
Checking It Once, Checking It Twice
Brandon says he had stopped for coffee on his way to work, and while it was brewing, he decided to check his lottery tickets.
But when the lottery self-checker displayed the amount he’d won, he had trouble believing it. So he took his ticket to another store and checked it again. The results were the same!
Brandon works as a server at a West Des Moines restaurant and says that while he arrived at work soon after that, he may have been a little off that night! He says he was probably more distracted than he should have been as he tried to absorb his lottery news.
How He Won
Brandon bought his winning ticket at Kum & Go, 3105 Grand Prairie Parkway in Waukee, for the Dec. 15 drawing in Lucky for Life.
His ticket matched the first five numbers but missed the Lucky Ball to win at the game’s second prize level of $25,000 a year for life. That night’s winning numbers were: 9-12-22-36-45 and Lucky Ball 3.
Kum & Go received a $500 bonus from the Iowa Lottery for selling the winning ticket.
Brandon chose to receive his prize in the lump-sum option of $390,000 rather than as annuity payments over time.
He says he plans to pay off bills and then invest the rest of his winnings for the future.
Iowa Winning Streak
Brandon is Iowa’s 3rd big winner in Lucky for Life in 3 months.
In November, a Des Moines man won the game’s top prize of $1,000 a day for life. And in October, another Des Moines man won at the game’s second prize level of $25,000 a year for life.
Iowa has now seen 23 winners at Lucky for Life’s top 2 prize levels since the game debuted here in January 2016.
Hi, Carlos. The $5 Jumbo Bucks Progressive InstaPlay game is still for sale and is shown on our website here: https://www.ialottery.com/Pages/Games-InstaPlay/InstaPlay.aspx
On our homepage, we now list the newest InstaPlay games that have progressive jackpots. Please be aware that Jumbo Bucks Progressive has been for sale here in Iowa since 2017 and the game is scheduled to end. It was put on our InstaPlay game-ending list back in November. Sales in the game will continue until its current progressive jackpot is won. As I'm writing this on the morning of Jan. 16, that prize currently stands at $22,017. We know that people are playing for a chance at that progressive jackpot and we want someone to win it! As soon as that occurs, the game will end.
Posted by: Mary Neubauer | January 16, 2025 at 08:48 AM
Hi so for the instant games when you go on the Iowa lottery website you don't show all I only saw the ones for like 30 and 20 and 10 you know but I did not see like the jumbo box anymore or some of the other ones can you please include them on your website thanks
Posted by: Carlos | January 11, 2025 at 09:35 PM