BC couple scoop $35M in lottery win

A BC couple has scooped up a whopping $35 million on the lottery.

Victoria couple Lahsen Rezrazi and Debbie Ramsay matched all seven lottery numbers and split the $70 million jackpot with a couple in Ontario that also picked the right numbers.

"On the way to pick up Debbie from work, I stopped by a Save-On-Foods to get milk and cream," Rezrazi said in a BCLC media release. "Then I thought I would check my lottery tickets. I won $10, a free play, and the last ticket I scanned said $35 million."

Rezrazi immediately called his wife with the news, but she didn't believe him.

"I thought something bad had happened," Ramsay said in the release. "It took everything in me not to scream, and I even went back to the store (where the ticket was purchased) to scan the ticket."

The couple plans to buy a house by the ocean and a Mercedes campervan to drive across Canada. They plan multiple stops along the way to see family.

"We’re going to go surprise relatives at the door to give them money," Ramsay said. "Helping family is the biggest thing for us, and we can’t wait to see their faces."

The couple says since winning the massive windfall there has been a swirling of emotions, and they have a lot to celebrate, including their upcoming wedding anniversary.

"It’s a lot of money," Rezrazi said.

The couple bought the winning ticket at Quality Foods in View Royal.

According to BCLC, in 2023, BC lottery players have won $130 million from Lotto Max, a nationwide lottery drawn twice a week.


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Ben Bulmer

After a decade of globetrotting, U.K. native Ben Bulmer ended up settling in Canada in 2009. Calling Vancouver home he headed back to school and studied journalism at Langara College. From there he headed to Ottawa before winding up in a small anglophone village in Quebec, where he worked for three years at a feisty English language newspaper. Ben is always on the hunt for a good story, an interesting tale and to dig up what really matters to the community.