South Bay Lottery Player Wins $247M Jackpot

SAN JOSE — A South Bay lottery player has claimed his $247 million prize, the California lottery officials said in a news release.

Edward Lojewski split the $494 Mega Millions jackpot with a Florida winner in an October drawing.

The 7-Eleven store at 1413 Kooser Road in San José, from which he purchased the winning ticket, will receive the maximum bonus of $1 million, lottery officials said.

Lojewski is described as a “faithful” lottery player who uses a computer to select his numbers, lottery officials said.

“I watched the news and saw the winning retailer and knew that was where I bought my tickets,” Lojewski, said in a statement.

“As soon as I saw I matched the first two numbers, I knew I won.”

The $494 million jackpot culminates a sequence that began in August and rolled 21 times, lottery officials said.

California’s public schools will receive a $37.8 million from the jackpot run, lottery officials said.

The California Lottery has provided $39 billion to schools since it began in 1985, but recent Associated Press report presents a grim view of the lottery from a socioeconomic standpoint.

Lotteries currently operate in all but five states and have been responsible for a “multibillion-dollar wealth transfer from low-income U.S. communities to powerful multinational companies,” The AP reports.

The assertion that lotteries benefit education has been called into question by Howard Center for Investigative Journalism at the University of Maryland study that notes “lotteries often compound inequities by disproportionately benefiting college students and wealthier school districts far from the neighborhoods where most tickets are sold.”

Lottery ticket retails are typically clustered in low-income communities, the study said.