Virginia Lottery Sells Record Number of Tickets

In bad economic times, plenty of people are hoping for a little luck.

A lot of people.

Lottery players have plunked down cash in record numbers over the past year, spending $1.48 billion worth of tickets.  All those sales brought the state of Virginia $444 million in profits, a 3-percent increase over last year.

The results are for the fiscal year that wrapped up on June 30.  But Virginia Lottery says it's not just taking - in the past year, the agency says it awarded a record amount of prize money.

Plenty of locals have been taking home a piece of the pie.  On August 10, a McLean man took a $107 million prize for picking the winning numbers in the Mega Millions game.  On July 20, a Fairfax woman took $100,000 in the Cash 5 game.  Also in July, a Woodbridge man didn't get cash, but he won a Ford F-150 in the Truckin' for Cash Sweepstakes.

Lottery executive Paula Otto said part of the success has come by increasing the number of lottery vendors.
 

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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