Who are the top 10 winners of Powerball and Mega Millions? Here are their stories

As the second largest Powerball jackpot in history looms on Saturday, here’s some data about past winners to guide you through.

Increase your odds? No. Still a 1 in 292 million chance. But as lottery folks say someone, someday will win.

The state with the most winners is California with three. One of them involved the largest jackpot ever — $1.586 billion. Bad news. Had to split with two other people.

The largest single winner was a woman from South Carolina, who chose to remain anonymous but told her story in a New York courtroom after the so-called “lottery lawyer” she hired swindled her out of $80 million. She won $1.537 billion and took a one-time payment of $878 million.

New York and Maryland have had two winners each.

Other states with big winners were Florida, Tennessee, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Kansas and Georgia.

Among the 10 largest lottery winners, Powerball had the most with six, Mega Millions had four.

Eleven states, including South Carolina, allow winners to remain anonymous, Pro tip: if you’re in a state that requires identification, create and trust or LLC.

Business Insider says based on zip codes of where tickets are bought, people of lesser means play the lottery all the time. People with money play when the pots grow huge.

A word of caution, many of the people who have won the most have had to deal with scammers.

Here’s what we know about the people who have won the 10 largest jackpots.

1. $1.586 Billion (Powerball)

This was 2016. The first time any jackpot grew past $1 billion. On Jan. 13, three tickets hit, each worth almost $530 million.

The first to come forward were John and Lisa Robinson of Munford, Tennessee, who went on the Today show to share their news. They chose the lump sum payout of $327.8 million and brought their dog to collect the check.

“We’re going to take the lump sum, because we’re not guaranteed tomorrow,” Robinson told AP. “We just wanted a little piece of the pie. Now we’re real grateful we got the big piece of the pie.”

She worked in a dermatologist’s office and he was a warehouse supervisor. They wanted to stay in Mumford, they told the AP at the time. But not long after, they bought a 10-bedroom home on 320 acres with a private lake for $6.2 million., Memphis television station FOX13 reported.

In Florida, Maureen Smith, 70, and her husband David Kaltschmidt, 55, of Melbourne Beach also had a winning ticket. They claimed the prize as The Nickel 95 Trust, Florida lottery officials said.

At a news conference, they declined to say what the name of the trust meant.

Smith said she had played the same numbers for years but didn’t play that often. She bought one ticket. They waited a month to cash in the ticket.

She said they would take care of their family. Kaltschmidt, who worked for Northrop Grumman as a manufacturing engineer for 34 years, intended to retire. He said he wanted to buy a new car. Smith wanted a massage.

2. $1.537 Billion (Mega Millions)

The South Carolina woman said during the trial against lawyer Jason Kurland that when she won Mega Millions on Oct. 23, 2018, she was in her late 50s, an insurance underwriter with a 401K and a checking account. Her husband was a lawyer.

They had been married 36 years and had grown children. She didn’t want riches to change anything.

Most important to them was that no one knew who they were.

Kurland directed them to sham investments benefiting him and his associates. He was found guilty in July on five counts of wire fraud, honest services wire fraud and money laundering, according to court documents.

She has managed to keep her identity secret.

3. $1.337 billion (Mega Millions)

Two Illinois residents won $1.337 billion on July July 29, 2022 and chose to remain anonymous. About all that’s known is the ticket was sold at a Speedway gas station in Des Plaines, Illinois, and they collected a $780.5 million pre-tax cash lump sum, eight weeks after the drawing.

4. $1.05 Billion (Mega Millions)

The Wolverine FLL Club won this prize on Jan. 22, 2021 in Michigan. The four members of the club elected a one-time lump sum payment of about $776 million. That amounts to about $557 million after tax.

5. $768.4 million (Powerball)

On March 27, 2019, 24-year-old Manuel Franco from Wisconsin won Powerball after playing the game since he was 18.

“It feels like a dream,” Franco said at a press conference when he cashed in his ticket.

He said he felt lucky when he bought the ticket at a Speedway and he almost looked up at the security camera and winked.

When he saw he won, he “screamed for about 5 or 10 minutes.”

6. $758.7 million (Powerball)

When Mavis Wanczyk cashed in her Powerball ticket to an Aug. 23, 2017 jackpot, she had already told her boss at Mercy Medical in Springfield, Massachusetts that she was quitting, Huff Post reported. Then 53, she said at a press conference, “It’s just a pipe dream I’ve always had.”

“I just want to sit back and relax,” she said.

7. $731.1 million (Powerball)

A group calling itself The Power Pack claimed the Jan. 20, 2021 jackpot in Maryland four months after the drawing. They told lottery officials they intended to invest, take care of family and help their community.

8. $699.8 million (Powerball)

Scott Godfrey told KSBY News he thought something was wrong with his ticket he bought in Morro Bay, California for the Oct. 4, 2021 drawing. He couldn’t possibly have won.

He said he set up a foundation “that’s going to receive quite a bit of the money for working on deliberate charitable things.”

“We feel blessed and we feel like there is a direct reason that we were entrusted with this,” Godfrey told the TV station. “That’s why we were so deliberate that this goes and does as much good to those who are less fortunate as possible.”

“We are private people, and we intend to stay that way,” Godfrey said in a release from the lottery commission. “We’ve also, for a long time, been involved in charitable activities and now we can really scale those efforts to take full appreciation of this blessing. This money is not about me. It’s about all of the good that can come from it.”

9. $687.8 million (Powerball)

Ticket holders in New York and Iowa won the Oct. 4, 2021 jackpot and each received $343.9 million. One of the tickets was sold in a New York City deli.

The other went to Lerynne West, who bought a ticket when she made a new start in Redfield, Iowa, Playusalotteries.com reported.

Then came the comedy of errors. She left her ticket at her sister’s house. Then when she checked it online it said no winner. She knew where the winning ticket was bought so she looked again and she had entered the wrong date.

“When I put the correct date in, it said ‘Jackpot. I thought I’ve done something wrong again.” she said at a news conference.

Then her daughters didn’t believe she had won.

She said she would help family and friends, create a college fund for her six grandchildren and fund the Callum Foundation named after a grandson who died that has an emphasis on poverty, hunger, education, animal welfare, and veteran affairs.

And she wanted to trade in her Ford Fiesta.

10. $656 million (Mega Millions)

A Red Budd, Illinois couple held one of three winning tickets to the March 30, 2012 drawing. Merle and Patricia Butler kept their win secret for three weeks, cashing in the ticket for $218.6 million.

“We are just everyday people who have worked hard all our life, who love our family and our city, pay our taxes and try and keep up with all the work that’s involved in owning and maintaining a house,” Merle Butler said at a press conference.

He was retired after working for General American Life Insurance in St. Louis for 25 years. Married 41 years at the time, the couple said they will invest the money and help out their two children and grandchildren and go to a few St. Louis Cardinals games.

They were the last to come forward for the prize.

In Maryland a group calling itself The Three Amigos composed of a woman in her 20s, a man in his 40s and a woman in her 50s, pooled their money and purchased 20 tickets each.

The man said in a press conference he wanted to establish college funds for his children, pay off his house and buy a house.

Backpacking through Europe was another response. The other woman wanted to visit Italy’s wine country.

“It’s so crazy that even celebrities are tweeting about this,” said one of them. “Even Britney Spears tweeted a congratulations message to the winners.”

The Kansas winner chose to remain anonymous.