LANSING, August 12, 2008 – Jagdish Patel is a lucky first time Mega Millions player! The Bloomfield Hills man matched four white ball numbers and the gold Mega ball number on July 18 and won a $10,000 prize!

Patel has no immediate plans for his prize money.

The lucky winning easy pick ticket was purchased at Ryan’s Party Store, 1837 Pine Grove Ave., in Port Huron.

Mega Millions is a multi-state lottery game in Michigan, California, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Texas, Virginia and Washington. Wagers cost $1 each and tickets may be purchased at nearly 11,000 Michigan Lottery retailers statewide.

Over 95 cents of every dollar spent on Lottery tickets is returned to the state in the form of contributions to the state School Aid Fund, prizes to players and commissions to retailers. In fiscal year 2007, the contribution to schools was $748.9 million. Since its inception in 1972, the Lottery has contributed more than $14.3 billion to education in Michigan.

For additional information, please visit the Lottery’s Web site at https://www.michiganlottery.com/.

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