Macon man wins $360K in lottery

He didn’t win a seat on Macon City Council during two runs in the 1990s, but a Macon businessman had the winning ticket of another kind earlier this month.

A Fantasy 5 slip he bought for the March 2 drawing matched all five lucky numbers and made him the landslide winner of $360,302.

Everett B. Slay, who according to lottery officials lives in Hampton, lost City Council races in 1991 and 1995 to Elaine Lucas and also made a failed bid for the Macon Water Authority in 1996.

Slay, 46, said Tuesday he runs a business in Macon and has future aspirations for public office.

Slay, who bought the ticket at the Dixie Food Store on Shurling Drive, told Georgia Lottery officials that when he won, a co-worker of his “pretty much fell over.”

But Slay didn’t.

“I’m too cool for that,” he said.

A lottery news release said Slay was a Mercer University business student, but he said Tuesday that he is not currently enrolled.

“They got that wrong,” he said, adding that he attended Fort Valley State. “I’m looking to go to Mercer.”

Another midstate winner recently hit the $500,000 jackpot on an instant-winner scratch-off Jumbo Jumbo Bucks card.

Gloria Baker, 60, of Dublin, who works at a discount store, bought her winner at the Express Mart on U.S. 80 in Jeffersonville.

She told lottery officials that after she won she couldn’t sleep.

“I am amazed,” said Baker, a mother of five. “It’s taking time to sink in.”