Back in 2010, Miller, a systems engineer who designs visual systems for flight simulators for Barco, a global technology company, won $1,000 on his Extra Pay instant ticket, which he bought from a vending machine at the Kroger on West Park Square in Xenia.
It had a TPD scratch-off that qualified him for the lottery’s Top Prize Drawing, done when a game is over or all the top prizes of that game are gone. Top Prize Drawings are an added feature available on all instant tickets that sell for $5 or more, said Ted Brown Jr., general manager of the Dayton regional lottery office. The instant TPD winnings for Extra Pay are now $5,500, Brown said.
Miller said he is not a big lottery player.
“I just did the scratch-off a couple times,” he said. “I was real happy to get $1,000. This is 150 times better and 10 times that. It’s a great feeling.”
The lottery wanted to surprise Miller with his latest win, so they told him they had a gift pack for him and that his signature on their paperwork from the $1,000 win was not legible and needed to be redone.
Shortly after 11:30 a.m. Brown called Miller into a small conference room where he presented him with a small black cooler pack with a lottery T-shirt inside, thanking him for his support of the lottery. He reminded him that his $1,000 winning ticket had entered him in a second-chance drawing and that he had a check for $150,000 from the drawing, held June 15 at the Ohio Lottery office in Cleveland, with Miller’s name on it. His ticket was picked from 28 entrants in the drawing.
“No way,” Miller said, as Brown pulled out a large honorary $150,000 check with Miller’s name on it and handed it to him. A real check, minus about 31 percent in withholding by the state (6 percent) and federal (25 percent) governments, will follow, Brown said.
Miller said he had no inkling of the real reason he had been called to the office. “Otherwise I would have been here about three hours ago,” he said.
The money will find good use, he said.
“I have a son starting college in a year.”
His wife Amy’s minivan is about 10 years old, and that may need to be replaced, he said. The couple have three children: Darick, 24, Kyle, 17, and Megan, 14.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” Miller said upon accepting the check.
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2341 or kullmer@DaytonDailyNews.com.
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