Damon Cherico and Shayna Flanders of Brick. (Photo: NJ Lottery)
State lottery officials said a lucky Brick couple is $250,000 richer after hitting the jackpot on a scratch-off game.
Damon Cherico and Shayna Flanders, both of Brick, are regular players of New Jersey Lottery scratch-off games, officials said, and they have always loved the crossword-style games. The couple goes to the same store each week – Joe’s Food Market on Herbertsville Road – for new tickets, hoping for a lucky one.
“The store has signs up displaying all the winning tickets it has sold, and Damon and Shayna were hoping to be added to the wall of winners,” said MaryAnn Rivell, lottery spokeswoman.
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While in the store recently, they noticed the retailer had just opened a pack of $250,000 crossword tickets and decided to grab the first ticket in the pack. After returning home, Damon was scratching off that $250,000 Crossword ticket, as Shayna was scratching off a ticket for a different game.
“Once I uncovered the letter ‘T’ on the ticket, I knew I was going to win at least something,” Cherico said.
He continued scratching and uncovered the “P” and “I” and turned to Shayna, saying, “We’re going to be OK.”
After uncovering eight words out of the possible 10, the anticipation started to set in. Finally, Damon uncovered the final letter “L” and realized they had matched all ten words – winning the quarter-million dollar jackpot.
The couple told Lottery officials that the big win led to a few sleepless nights as they tried to process the good fortune, hardly able to believe they were so lucky.
Damon and Shayna intend to use some of their prize to get ahead of bills and replace their older cars, saving the remainder for their future.
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