Winners

A Case of Blurry Vision Gives Hartford Man the Surprise of a LifetimeWhen Armando Ortiz wasn’t able to catch the CT Lottery’s nightly drawings on TV July 22, had asked his elderly mother if she would watch them in his place and write down the winning numbers for him. The next day, Armando compared the Cash5 numbers she had written to those printed on his tickets, and he was happy—one ticket had matched four out of the five winning numbers drawn for a $300 prize.

“I went to the retailer and scanned my ticket in the ticket checker and thought, something’s wrong. Instead of $300, it said $97,328,” Armando told lottery officials. “So, I asked the retailer for a print out of the winning numbers to double check. When he gave me the printout he said, ‘You didn’t win $300, you won the top prize—$97,328!’”

Armando matched all five of the winning Cash5 numbers drawn on July 22: 6 - 15 - 22 - 23 - 33. In total, 3,229 winning tickets were sold statewide, with prizes ranging in value from $2 to $97,328.

“The funny thing is, my mother apologized for getting one of the numbers wrong. She wrote down 28 instead of 23. She said she couldn’t see well without her glasses on,” Armando said with a laugh.

Armando said the unexpected prize money will be put to good use. “I’m going to fix my car, give some money to my family and bank the rest.”

Armando purchased his Cash5 winning ticket at Mobil On The Run, located at 234 Washington Street in Hartford. Mobil On The Run will receive a $1,000 bonus from the CT Lottery for selling the winning ticket.