Skokie Resident Scratched $20 Illinois Lottery Card To Reveal A $1 Million Windfall
Ray Hermez holds his winning ticket at the Illinois Lottery headquarters.
A Skokie resident became an instant millionaire when he won an Illinois Lottery 'Fabulous Fortune' lottery earlier this week.
Illinios Lottery officials confirmed that Ray Hermez won $1,000,000 when he scratched off the ticket he purchased at the Shell station in Skokie.
The Shell station at 5132 Dempster Ave in Skokie where Ray Hermez bought his winning ticket.
Hermez, a 48-year-old who has lived in Skokie for 14 years, was at home when he used a penny to scratch off the $20 ticket and discover his million dollar win.
“I plan to use this money to help my family,” he said when he presented his ticket at the Lottery Prize Center in Des Plaines.
The Shell station that sold Hermez the ticket received a bonus of $10,000, equal to one percent of the prize amount, for selling the winning ticket.
Another winner: Burbank resident Marie Baio holds her main prize of $4 Million for the Fabulous Fortune in January 2016.
Fabulous Fortune is a $20 instant ticket that that offered four top prizes of $4,000,000 and eight prizes of $1,000,000.
Founded in 1974, the Illinois Lottery has contributed over $19 billion since 1985 to the state’s Common School Fund to assist K-12 public schools, as well as hundreds of millions of dollars to the Capital Projects Fund and to special causes like Illinois Veterans services, the fight against breast cancer, MS research, Special Olympics and assistance for people living with HIV/AIDS. In addition to playing in-store, the Illinois Lottery offers online and mobile play for all draw-based Illinois Lottery games at illinoislottery.com.