Road worker unearths winning ticket (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

Road worker unearths winning ticket

8:57am Friday 15th February 2008 in Swindon By James Wallin

A ROAD worker has scooped £102,500 after digging a winning lottery ticket out of his wallet.

The ticket dated back to October 31 and Terry Norman-Thorpe only realised that he'd struck lucky when he checked online last week.

The 25-year-old, from Great Coxwell near Faringdon, described how at first he thought it must be a computer error.

He said: "My girlfriend Leanne had the computer on to check the EuroMillions results, so I thought I might as well check the tickets I had in my wallet.

"There were 12 of them in there altogether and I started checking through them one by one.

"I got to this lucky dip from October and the number started flashing.

"I actually turned the computer off and on again just to make sure what I was reading was real."

Terry shouted to Leanne to go and check for him.

Leanne, 22, said: "I was really annoyed with him at first because I thought he was just messing around.

"Then when I saw the numbers I thought he'd fixed them."

When the reality did sink in the couple immediately worried that the ticket might be out of date. Terry said: "It was a Sunday so we couldn't get through to Camelot. We just hoped it was still valid."

Eventually the win was confirmed when the couple took the ticket to a nearby Tesco.

Leanne said: "My immediate thoughts were that it was a mistake, or that someone else had claimed it.

"When we found out it really was the winning ticket we were just shocked."

The winning ticket matched five numbers and the bonus ball.

Terry has big plans for the money, with a wish list already written out.

He said: "First of all I'm looking into buying a sports car, but I'm still at looking at which model.

"We're going to have a holiday in Egypt, and I'm hoping to put some money towards a house.

"If there's anything left, it'll be going in the bank."

Terry's luck didn't stop there. The next day he found that he'd won another £10 on a separate ticket.