Player wagers $50 on one Florida Lottery ticket at Publix and wins huge lump of cash

Coming in at second place sounds disappointing when a Florida Lottery ticket cost $50, but 63-year-old Wilfredo Soto still ended up with a life-changing pile of cash.

Soto bought his scratch-off ticket in the $1,000,000 A YEAR FOR LIFE SPECTACULAR, and the game has a not-so-chintzy $1 million as its second-tier prize.

He showed up to collect Monday, March 17, and opted for a lump sum versus annual payments. His check came to $640,000 after tax withholdings, officials said.

Odds of winning $1 million in the game are 1 in 185,709.

The two top prizes of $1 million a year for life have already been won (in Jacksonville and Fort Lauderdale), so Soto never had a shot at beating the 1 in 21,727,995 odds to win at that level.

And in case you’re wondering, a lump-sum check for the top prize is $16 million, records show.

Soto bought his ticket at the Publix on Van Dyke Road in Lutz, about a 15-mile drive north from Tampa. The store got a $2,000 commission for selling the winning ticket, officials said.

This story was originally published March 17, 2025 at 1:39 PM with the headline "Player wagers $50 on one Florida Lottery ticket at Publix and wins huge lump of cash."