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Alfredo Mendez bought the scratcher on a whim when he stopped to fill his tank with gas at the ampm station on 1403 South Santa Fe Avenue in Vista. Afterwards, he went about his day forgetting to sratch the ticket.
It wasn't until later when Mendez went to order food, that he remembered the ticket. Once he scratched the ticket and he revealed that it was worth $1 million, he thought it was ajoke. “I was thinking it was a joke or something. I was like, ‘No way! Hold on!’” Mendez told lottery officials. “I really thought it was a prank until I scanned it on the (California Lottery) app and it turned green and said the amount. I thought it was a fake.”
In a press release, Mendez said, “This is going to change our lives. I just want to focus on trying to buy a house for my kids. We’ve been renting so long. It would be a dream to finally have a place of our own.”
Mendez won with a 50X Fortune Scratchers ticket.