They were one number away from a $348 million payout.
John Scroggs and his husband, Paul Robles, of Richmond, California, recently claimed $307,406 with a winning Powerball ticket. The East Bay couple matched five of the six numbers in the drawing—missing the red Powerball number—which meant they were just one number shy of winning the $348 million jackpot available at the time.
Scroggs discovered their good fortune when checking the results on a Check-A-Ticket machine.
“I immediately went kind of pale,” Scroggs said. “I thought, this is not real.” He then headed to the car where his husband was waiting along with the couples’ two infant sons.
Both men work as administrators at Bay Area university campuses; one within the University of California system and the other at a private school in the South Bay. The new parents say they’ve had a lot of sleepless nights since the wonderful addition of their two babies.
“We have two 8-month-old boys… Certainly put some of that in a future college fund,” Robles said. “And a good portion of it in a retirement fund.”
Powerball is played in 44 states (plus the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands). The next jackpot will be drawn tomorrow; the current jackpot stands at $40.
