Farmington Man Wins '5 Card Cash' Lottery

It seemed like the right thing to do for Ray Elling and his wife, Marilyn to toast their unexpected lottery windfall over lunch at the Good News Café in Woodbury Sunday afternoon.  

Earlier that day, when Elling checked the CT Lottery’s website, he discovered the “cards” on his “5 Card Cash” draw ticket for June 21 were a perfect match to the winning hand drawn on that date:  9C - 8C - 8D - 3S - 2H (9 of Clubs, 8 of Clubs, 8 of Diamonds, 3 of Spades, 2 of Hearts). Elling’s five-card top prize match was worth $255,555.

“When I saw the match, I called Marilyn to come to the computer to see if it was really true. It was pretty hard to believe,” Elling said. “It wasn’t until we came to Lottery headquarters (Monday) that we found out for sure that we won.”

In addition to Elling’s $255,555 top prize, 459 tickets on that date contained a match for prizes ranging from $20 to $555. A total of 25,448 tickets had “Instant Win” prizes ranging from a $2 (free ticket) to $100. More than 1,300,000 winning 5 Card Cash tickets have been sold to date.

Elling is the fourth lucky winner to make a five-card match since ticket sales for 5 Card Cash began on May 4. On Monday, Elling accepted a prize check from Lottery officials for $174,545 (value after taxes) with plans already in place for his prize.

“We’re having a family reunion next month in San Diego to celebrate my 85th birthday,” Elling told lottery officials. “We have four grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. We plan on giving a (monetary) gift to each of them.”

For selling Elling his winning ticket, Route 4 Quick Stop at 46 Farmington Ave. in Farmington also will receive a check from the CT Lottery for $2,500.