Sometimes a person’s life changes for the better in a completely unexpected way. Something similar happened to Tayeb Souami. He wanted to return a carton of orange juice at a local store and won $315 million in a lottery. According to Indy100, at the time of his win in 2018, he was married and the father of two children and lived in New Jersey.
Despite working as an accountant for a food importer, the then 56-year-old was still struggling financially. He had reportedly refinanced his home to pay for his children’s college tuition, and his wife was determined to spend as little money as possible, so she sent her husband back to a store to return a $5 bottle of juice, saying it was “too expensive” and he could get juice cheaper elsewhere. When he returned to the store on May 19, he saw a sign at the customer service counter advertising the Powerball jackpot and bought two tickets with the money he got after returning the orange juice, according to CBS New York.
He almost forgot about it until the next day, when he decided to get his car washed. On the way there, he saw a 7-Eleven and remembered buying two tickets. “When I went in, I scanned the first ticket. It wasn’t the winner and the second ticket was valid. That day, it said, ‘Must be seen by the dealer,'” Souami said at a news conference. He thought the machine wasn’t working, but the woman at the register checked and said, “Oh my God! Oh my God!” and then told him he had won “big, very big.” He recalled, “I’m an accountant. I like looking at numbers. I know how to read numbers, but I was scared to see the numbers.”
Souami then saw that he had won the jackpot. He said that it took him two hours to fill out the form because his hands were shaking. He then returned home and told his wife about the big win and she couldn’t believe it. “It was a very emotional day for me,” he said. He went on to say that he didn’t quit his job because of the lottery money, but because he has to work every day. When asked at the press conference if he regularly tries his luck in the lottery, he replied that he does so occasionally when he likes the numbers or when there is a big jackpot. The 56-year-old also mentioned that he wants to use the money for his children’s education, which is his priority.
Miriam Long of Christiansburg, Virginia, also won around $1 million in March 2024. The woman thought she would win a cash prize, but not that much. She wanted to buy a Mega Million jackpot, which is known for its $800+ prizes. She wanted to buy this lottery and accidentally got a Powerball ticket. According to her, it was the “best mistake of her life.” She let the computer randomly pick the numbers on her ticket. She didn’t expect that one mistake would help her win big.
