Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, January 9, 1993 TAG: 9301090299
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO NOTE: BELOW
SOURCE: MARK MORRISON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
FAMILY HITS JACKPOT ON MOM'S LUCKY TICKET
Mom bought the ticket, but they're splitting the jackpot three ways.After taxes, $47,826 a year - each.
For 20 years.
That is what the Mullins family agreed to after Suzanne Mullins learned she had won $4.2 million in Wednesday's Lotto drawing. Actually, that is how Mullins; her husband, Tommy; and their daughter, Susan, had agreed long ago to split the pot should the family ever win big.
Any winning ticket would be a family ticket.
Still, Mom almost always did the buying. She is the superstitious one in the family. She said she was born on Friday the 13th, she never crosses a black cat's trail and she always enters and leaves a house by the same door. "Crazy stuff," she said after a news conference Friday at the Virginia Lottery office in Roanoke.
Her superstitions also include buying lottery tickets exclusively at 7-Eleven stores. The winner was purchased at the 7-Eleven at Grandin Road and Guilford Avenue in Southwest Roanoke.
A dedicated Lotto player, Mullins said she spends $5 for five tickets on each Lotto drawing with a jackpot of more than $1 million. Lotto drawings are held twice a week.
She said she will continue to play.
Her winning numbers were: 3, 24, 31, 35, 42 and 44. Although she often chooses her own numbers, Mullins, 50, said that for Wednesday's Lotto drawing, she let the computer do the picking for her.
Either way, it was only a matter of time before she won big, her husband and daughter said. Whatever the reason - superstitions or not - they said that Mullins is extraordinarily lucky.
She won $42 in the Lotto just last Saturday, and $41 in November, they said. Overall, the Mullinses estimated they have spent only about $200 out-of-pocket on the lottery since it began three years ago.
"It's not unusual for her to hit four numbers twice a week," her husband said. The odds of hitting six numbers and winning Wednesday's $4.2 million were one in 7.2 million, according to lottery officials.
Tommy Mullins, 51, said he has no plans to retire early from his job a vice president for the Amalgamated Transit Union, where he negotiates contracts for bus drivers, mechanics and other transit workers.
"I enjoy my job," he said.
Susan Mullins, 27, is a child-care worker at Vinton Child Care Center. She said she also plans to continue working. She is the only one in the family who said she would treat herself to any indulgences with their newfound wealth. She wants a new car to replace the 1986 Pontiac Grand Am she drives now.
She said she didn't know yet what kind of car she wants, however.
As for charities, Tommy Mullins said they have a favorite cause they may contribute to, but he would not say which one. Further, he said they would direct any charity requests to their lawyer, Thomas Dickenson, who attended Friday's press conference.
Dickenson said he has a simple answer prepared for those requests: "No."
Suzanne Mullins discovered she won Thursday morning when her daughter heard on the radio that the winning ticket had been purchased at the Grandin Road 7-Eleven.
Mullins compared her ticket with the winning numbers in the Thursday morning newspaper. When she realized she won, Mullins said she couldn't contain her excitement. It alarmed her daughter.
"She thought I was being attacked. I was screaming, `My God! My God! I won!' "
Tommy Mullins was out of town, preparing to fly home from Raleigh, N.C. She unsuccessfully tried to page him at the airport there, then met him when he arrived back in Roanoke. Her daughter held a sign up for him: "We did it!"
"Did what?" he asked.
"It was a great way to come home," he said.