Toronto —
Raymond Sobeski is a patient man.
The 40-something farmer allowed a lottery ticket worth $30-million to sit untouched in a safety deposit box for almost a year, refusing to tell even his mother about his extraordinary good fortune because he didn't want to "do anything rash."
With only 12 days to go before the ticket expired, Mr. Sobeski became the winner of the largest single jackpot in Canadian history by coming forward Thursday with the numbers that matched the Super 7 draw of last April 11.
As cameras flashed and reporters looked on in envy, the reserved bachelor from the small community of Princeton, near Brantford, Ont., said the win still feels "surreal."
"Due to the magnitude of it, I just wanted to make sure that I did everything right and try to remain calm about it," said Mr. Sobeski, adding that he was more interested in creating a legal and financial plan than gathering interest.
He bought his ticket at a corner store near his home with only 15 minutes to go until the April draw. He checked the randomly selected Quick Pick numbers two weeks later.
"I didn't check it right away because I bought many lottery tickets, and you check so many, and you never win anything at all," said Mr. Sobeski, adding that he's even found expired lottery tickets tucked away in drawers. The most he had ever won before this was $10.
When he learned that his long period of little return had ended, he wasn't about to dive headfirst into the good life. He placed the ticket in a safety deposit box and checked the numbers "about 200 times."
Mr. Sobeski supplemented his income as a self-employed computer repairman while keeping his windfall a secret. But he did allow himself some indulgences; he admits maxing out all his credit cards.
The fact that he no longer needs to worry about how he will pay those bills does not mean he intends to say goodbye to agriculture. Mr. Sobeski said he plans to live more comfortably but will continue to work on his farm. The computer business, however, is a thing of the past. "That's done for sure now," he laughed. "I'd much rather be farming."
Last summer, when Mr. Sobeski was in a local Brantford bank branch, he overheard a couple discussing the lottery win at the next teller.
Motioning in his direction, the man told his girlfriend, "'This guy could be the winner right here,'" Mr. Sobeski said. "I just kind of smirked and walked out."
There have been other lottery prizes this large, but none has been claimed by a single individual. In May, 2002, a Super 7 ticket worth $37.8-million was divided among 28 people who had shares in the four winning tickets.
The fact that no winner had stepped forward to claim the giant prize last April left officials concerned that it would go unclaimed. The tickets expire after a year. The Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp. took out a full-page ad in a Brantford newspaper, knowing that the winning ticket had been sold in the area.
"I thought it was in my best interest to keep it to myself until I had everything all sorted out," Mr. Sobeski said. He waited until this week to tell his family.
He plans to take up travelling, invest some of the money and donate to charitable organizations he would not name. He also wants to share his money with his parents, two sisters and one brother.
If he had cashed the ticket last April and invested the winnings, he could have made more than $700,000 in interest.
With guaranteed investment certificates at an average one-year rate of 2.45 per cent, his winnings would have grown to $30,712,908. Canadian government bonds at a one-year yield of 3.76 per cent would have increased the prize to $31,094,097.
