John and Lisa Robinson say they are America’s newest millionaires, and chose to go on television first to make the announcement.
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John Robinson and his wife Lisa bought four tickets on Wednesday night at a grocery store in Mumford, Tenn.
When co-host Carson Daily asked whether he was nervous about carrying a ticket worth more than $100 million in his front pocket, Robinson admitted that, “Now I’m nervous because everybody knows”.
When the clerk told her it was too large to cash the prize, Kathryn said: “I knew it was really happening”. Lawyers who have represented lottery winners in the past said jackpot winners become targets when their identities are revealed and they are sometimes harassed or get talked into bad investments.
Three ticket holders will split the record-setting $1.6 billion Powerball jackpot.
The Today show averages about 5 million viewers a day.
Robinson said he and his wife were excited about their winnings but were “a little scared” about their future. The Robinsons have two children. Talking seriously with experts in tax law, financial planning, privacy, security and other safeguards can help keep them, and their winnings, safe, they say. They planned to go to Tennessee lottery officials after appearing on TODAY.
The first victor showed up early Thursday to claim her $1 million prize – Linda Windey, who works in Walton, Ky.
She watched the Powerball drawing and wrote down the numbers.
Robinson said he and his wife, Lisa, want to pay off the mortgage on their current home, but don’t plan to buy a sprawling chateau or the like because “you gotta clean them”.
He said the family appreciates community, family values and have always lived within their means.
Edward Blunt describes what happened when his mother won one million dollars in the recent record Powerball drawing.
“I wrote the numbers down and I got to looking and I saw it and looked again”, she said.
Tennessee Lottery has not verified the ticket, which John Robinson had been keeping in the front pocket of his shirt.
Any doubts were erased Friday afternoon when the Tennessee lottery tweeted out confirmation that the Robinsons had come to their headquarters to claim the prize.
Spokesman Josh Nass says he was told the nurse’s son sent her a cellphone picture of a ticket.
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John told reporters he bought that winning ticket on his way home from work.
