Markham woman wins $675K lottery prize

A Markham woman won $675,000 playing the Illinois Lottery.

LaSaunya Jackson won the prize when her “Lucky Day Lotto” ticket matched all five numbers in the Nov. 15 evening drawing, according to the Illinois Lottery. Jackson used the birthdays of family members as her numbers.

“This is so exciting,” Jackson said as she presented her ticket at the Illinois Lottery Prize Center in Chicago. “I’m absolutely overwhelmed.

Jackson bought the ticket at the Marathon gas station at 2 E. 159th St. in Harvey, the lottery said. She was at her Markham home when her husband checked the numbers on the lottery’s website and told her that she’d won.

“I didn’t believe him,” said Jackson, who plans to used the windfall for paying bills and investing. “I never imagined we wound win such a big prize so I thought he must be joking.”

Two winning tickets split the $1.35 million jackpot for Nov. 15’s “Lucky Day Lotto” drawing, the lottery said. The other winning ticket was sold at Luciano’s Grocery at 1714 W. 18th St. in the Heart of Chicago neighborhood. Marathon and Luciano’s each received a bonus of $6,750, or one percent of the prize amount, for selling the winning tickets.