Good Person of the Week: Shop Owner Returns $1Million Lottery Ticket Owner Discarded

Imagine buying a lottery ticket and thinking it wasn't a winner (but it is), and turning it into a store for a second chance drawing (for those you have to write your name, phone and address on the back. Well, that's what happened in Massachusetts recently, and the shop owner discovered it, and notified the woman. One thing that troubled me about this story is that there are absolutely NO photos on the Internet of the heroes who own the shop!  Only the lottery winner. The shop owners are from India and need to have their photos on-line! They are heroes!  - That aside, here's the great story. 

Caption:  The Lucky Spot in Southwick, Massachusetts was lucky for Lea Rose Fiega - because the shop owners were so wonderful. 

by: Jillian Andrews, Nexstar Media Wire

Massachusetts family returns winning $1M lottery ticket to customer who threw it away May 23, 2021 / 06:05 PM EDT Fox 59 TV

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (WWLP) – One Massachusetts family returned a lottery ticket to the customer who had tossed it after the family discovered the ticket had won $1 million.

Abhi Shah, the son of the owner of Lucky Spot, where the ticket was sold, said his mother, Aruna Shah, sold the winning ticket to one of their regular customers. The ticket sat discarded in the store for 10 days after the customer assumed it wasn’t worth anything and handed it back to be tossed out for the second-chance drawing.

“One evening, I was going through the tickets from the trash and [noticed] that she didn’t scratch the number,” Abhi Shah said. “I scratched the number and it was $1 million underneath the ticket.”

$1.5B Mega Millions winner finally comes forward The Shahs said it wasn’t an easy decision to return the ticket.

“We didn’t sleep two nights,” said Maunish Shah, owner of Lucky Spot. “He called my mom, grandparents in India, they said, ‘Give it back, we don’t want that money.’”

The family then decided to return the ticket. Since the customer, Lea Rose Fiega, visited the store often, they knew where to find her.

“As soon as she came in, I hand her the $1 million ticket, and she freaked out and cried like a baby,” said Maunish Shah. “She sat down on the floor right here.”

The Lucky Spot, proving to be a lucky spot, is also home to some very kind people.

Lea Rose Fiega, the Massachusetts woman who almost threw away a winning lottery ticket.Massachusetts State Lottery