Powerball Winner Immediately Quits 'Nasty, Dirty' Job

'I don't want to work there no more'
By Michael Harthorne,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 6, 2015 4:42 PM CDT
Powerball Winner Immediately Quits 'Nasty, Dirty' Job
Julie Leach holds her $310 million check on Tuesday as the Michigan Lottery Commission announces she was the sole winner of the state's huge Powerball jackpot.   (Dale G. Young/The Detroit News via AP)

For nearly 23 years, Julie Leach worked at a fiberglass company in Michigan, what she calls a "nasty, dirty job," NBC News reports. She was at a nearby McDonald's—on break during a particularly bad overnight shift—when she found out she was the sole winner of the state's Sept. 30 $310.5 million Powerball jackpot. According to ABC News, Leach didn't have to think about what to do for very long. "I quit automatically," she says. "I was done." The 50-year-old Leach tells NBC: "I'll go visit, but I don't want to work there no more."

When Leach woke her boyfriend of 36 years to tell him the good news, he said he had to get back to sleep to wake up for his metal casting job in the morning, NBC reports. "I said, 'Are you crazy? We don't have to work anymore,'" Leach says. According to ABC, Leach is taking the lump sum option, which comes to approximately $140 million after taxes. She plans on paying off debts, traveling, and buying "a bunch of land" for her three children and 11 grandchildren, NBC reports. "I’m going to take care of my kids," she says. "I don’t want them to work the way I had to work and deal with the things I had to deal with in life. I want to make it a good life for them and take care of them." (More lottery stories.)

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