MENIFEE, CA — When a Riverside County man and notorious family prankster recently won $5 million from a Maximum Millions Scratchers ticket, getting his wife to take him seriously proved to be no laughing matter.
Eugene Brown, of Meniffee, admits his wife had good reason to think she was being pranked, according to the CA Lottery.
"One time I told her one of her favorite singers had passed and then recorded her reaction," he said. And yes, winning $5 million on a lottery ticket would have been the perfect setup, he admits.
On this particular day, Brown was providing his wife with some much-needed respite from him and their child, a CA Lottery spokesperson said.
"He took their toddler out for breakfast and a walk, and on the way, stopped by the ARCO ampm on the corner of Newport and Menifee Road in Menifee to pick up two Maximum Millions Scratchers," they said. For Brown, this is "regular entertainment."
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“If she hadn’t asked me to go out, I might not have gone to the store,” Brown said. “Or I would’ve gone later, and somebody else would’ve gotten the ticket. But everything lined up in the universe.”
Brown returned home with his ticket, and his wife took over childcare duties again. Once upstairs, he set to scratching his tickets. Purchased for $20 each, the tickets have a maximum prize value of $5 million, according to the CA Lottery.
First, he won $75.
Moving on to the next game card, he saw a 5 with a lot of zeroes.
Was it $5,000? Was it $50,000?
Who better to ask than his wife?
When he asked her to look at the ticket and see if she saw what he did, she answered: “It’s $5 million. Could you please take the garbage out? I’m not in the mood right now.”
“No, I’m serious,” Brown replied. “We won $5 million!”
“You’d better not be lying,” his wife said.
But he knew this was no laughing matter. Brown won the top prize, one of only three top prizes, on the Maximum Millions game. There remain 36 $100,000 winning tickets left, according to the state lottery website.
"Eugene is also well aware of the California Lottery’s mission of providing extra money to public schools, and that hits close to home for him and his wife," a CA Lottery official said.
"It’s all part of giving back,” he said. “My wife is a teacher, and education to me has always been paramount.”
Ultimately, Brown credits his faith for this win.
“I’m not lucky. I’m blessed,” he said. “I’m going to invest my winnings, pay off my house, and put it all in a trust to work on creating some generational wealth for my children.”
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