 Gerald Clement, 50, of Ottawa has been playing the same lottery numbers month after month always hoping for a big win. On Friday, August 13, his wish came true. (JENNY YUEN/QMI Agency)
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TORONTO - Gerald Clement of Ottawa has been playing the same lottery numbers month after month, always hoping for a big win.
In the end, it was a quick pick that brought him his fortune.
On Friday, his wish came true. He claimed his $25-million prize, bought for the Aug. 13 Lotto Max draw after cashing in eight months’ worth of free plays.
Clement turned 50 in July.
“I’m going to do a hell of a lot of golfing and fishing after this,” Clement told journalists at a Toronto press conference Tuesday afternoon.
He also plans to travel — something he hasn’t done for 10 years.
Clement has spent his time mainly on a construction site and says he’ll continue to build things out of joy, but probably not for a paycheque.
While Ontario waited for him to come forward, Clement spent a week preparing himself for the life-changing moment when he receives $25 million.
“I’m so lucky to have a close-knit network of family and friends that I could turn to in this situation. It took me a long time to process this, and I checked my ticket at the self-scanner about five times,” said the happy winner at the OLG Toronto Prize Centre, where he claimed.
The winning ticket was purchased at Michael’s Confectionary on Somerset St. E. in Ottawa.
Owner Sally Daoud said Clement was a regular from the neighbourhood who came in last Wednesday to tell them he’d won and was keeping the ticket “in a safe place” until he’d decided what to do about it.
According to OLG, Clement walked into the agency’s Toronto headquarters shortly before noon Tuesday to claim the prize, which is half of the $50 million jackpot. The other half went to a group in Lac-Saint-Jean, Quebec.
Daoud said Clement’s hand-picked numbers earned him a free ticket — the numbers on it being randomly chosen by the lotto machine. It was these randomly chosen numbers that made him a multi-millionaire.
“We’ve been running the store for 20 years — since July 1990 — and that’s the first million we’ve had,” said Daoud, adding the largest prior had been a $49,000 ticket.
She said other store owners have told her business picks up when a winning ticket is sold.
“I’m glad my store gave him that. I think people will come. Other places told me people go because they think it’s a lucky store,” said Daoud. “That would be great.”
