$1.35 Billion Mega Millions Jackpot Winner Steps Up to Claim Prize

The win­ner of the $1.35 bil­lion Mega Mil­lions jack­pot, the fourth largest in U.S. his­to­ry, has stepped for­ward to receive his prize, state offi­cials said Wednesday.

The win­ner of the Jan­u­ary draw was and remains a mystery.

The Maine Lot­tery said the win­ner chose to col­lect the cash option through a lim­it­ed lia­bil­i­ty com­pa­ny, LaKo­ma Island Invest­ments LLC, rather than remain anony­mous and receive full pay­outs over time.

“Win­ners care­ful­ly con­sid­er the best uses of life-chang­ing awards,” a rep­re­sen­ta­tive said in a statement.

By opt­ing for the cash option, the win­ner will receive a one-off pre-tax $723,564,144, offi­cials said.

Win­ners could choose to appear in per­son with their win­ning tick­et or remain anony­mous through a trust, lot­tery offi­cials said.

Win­ning tick­ets will be val­i­dat­ed when rep­re­sen­ta­tives come to the lot­tery head­quar­ters in Augus­ta on Fri­day, and bank trans­fers of the mon­ey will be made before the end of the week, Michael Board­man, of the main lot­tery of alco­holic bev­er­ages and lot­tery oper­a­tions. the office’s deputy direc­tor said.

“I under­stand why some­one would want to remain anony­mous with this amount of mon­ey. We wish them hap­pi­ness and hope they do good with it,” he said.

I bought my win­ning tick­et in the Jan­u­ary 13th draw at Lebanon’s home­town Gas & Grill, locat­ed on a busy road in a small town near the bor­der with New Hampshire.

Shop­keep­er Fred Cot­low said he had no idea who had the win­ning ticket.

“We’ll wait to see if it’s local. Who knows? Some­times they come to the store and say thank you, but I’m not going to lose any sleep over it.” “No,” Cot­trow shared half of the store’s $50,000 prof­it from win­ning tick­et sales to his employees.

Board­man said there would have been 30 pay­outs over 29 years had the win­ner cho­sen to receive the full amount.

By accept­ing cash pay­ments, the win­ner will receive more than $498 mil­lion after tax­es, Board­man said. In tax­es, $173.6 mil­lion will go to the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment and $51 mil­lion to state gov­ern­ments. The lim­it­ed lia­bil­i­ty com­pa­ny receiv­ing the award was incor­po­rat­ed out­side the state.

The win­ner broke the 1 in 302.6 mil­lion odds in Fri­day the 13th’s draw to become Maine’s first lot­tery win­ner. He is the first Maine win­ner to win the Mega Mil­lions jack­pot in 45 states, the Dis­trict of Colum­bia and the U.S. Vir­gin Islands.