Powerball Winner Roy Cockrum Wins Largest Jackpot Ever In Tennessee Lottery History, Vows To Give Money To Charity

Powerball winner Roy Cockrum is making history for taking home the largest Powerball jackpot ever in Tennessee lottery history. But what makes this story even better is that the man is giving much of his large prize away to charity.

In a related report by The Inquisitr, two not-so-lucky men sued the New Jersey lottery after they threw away a lotto ticket worth $1 million. Ouch! But the luckiest lotto player ever has some simple yet expensive tips to winning the lottery on a regular basis.

Mr. Cockrum is a 58-year-old Knoxville man who was born and raised in the area, but left to pursue a career in theater. He spent the next 20 years working as an actor and a stage manager before he joined The Society of Saint John the Evangelist, an Episcopal monastery in Cambridge, Mass. But eventually he came home to Knoxville to take care of his parents in their old age, and he currently has a small business in the area.

Cockrum picked the Powerball winner while at a Kroger grocery store and it’s interesting how he came to find out he had the numbers 14-18-25-33-49 plus a Powerball of 23:

“It’s a hard thing to process; your brain doesn’t want to believe it. I was in a rush to take Mom to a medical appointment when I first checked the ticket. I saw the Powerball match and three winning numbers and thought, ‘Wow! $500! You never win that much on Powerball.’ I felt really lucky. But then wait a minute, wait a minute — there’s another number, and finally I realized I hit the jackpot. It literally knocked me to my knees. My prayer was simple — ‘Lord have Mercy!’ But life goes on, so I picked myself up, put the winning ticket in my wallet and went to pick up my mother. I walked around University of Tennessee Medical Center all that morning with a $259.8 million winner in my pocket…. Everywhere I went people were talking about the Powerball winner, not knowing I was standing right in front of them. Many people said, ‘I heard it’s a UPS guy.’ Another lady had heard ‘for sure’ that it was a young woman with a baby that bought the winning ticket. For the record, I do not work for UPS, and I am not a young woman with a baby.”

The Powerball winner has chosen to take cash for his Powerball jackpot, meaning he will receive $115,147,525.50. He already has it planned out how he will spend the money. First he plans on giving “large gifts to a long list of charities, including a number of religious organizations and local charities.” He’s already picked out the charities, and he’ll also be helping out performing arts associations around the United States. Of course, he’s not giving it all away since he’s setting up a retirement pension fund for himself and his family.

Unfortunately, many lottery winners have a tendency to come to a bad end, whether through losing all the money or by death and murder. Cockrum feels “blessed” and “grateful” to be “one of the luckiest people in the world,” but he also believes his religious background prepared him for the Powerball jackpot:

“I really believe the best way to prepare for this tsunami of cash has been to live under a vow of poverty for a number of years. It gives great perspective…. I have received great counsel, and I will continue working very hard to make sure every single penny of this prize is a blessing to anyone it touches.”

What do you think about this Powerball winner?