Swansea greenkeeper finds £1m EuroMillions ticket in his car after four months

Darren Burfitt, a 44-year-old greenkeeper at Langland Bay Golf Club in Swansea, stopped at Morrisons Daily in Penllergaer on the way to a family caravan holiday. He bought a EuroMillions ticket for the draw on Friday 18 October 2024, and it carried the Millionaire Maker code JDDF38095, worth £1 million.

The ticket sat with a few others in the central console of his grey Citroen DS4 for about four months. He never locked the car, which he described as a shed on wheels held together with mud.

After an appeal for the missing winner, family and friends kept telling him to check his tickets. One Sunday his four-year-old son wanted a half-finished bag of crisps from the car, so Darren brought the tickets in too. The most crumpled one would not scan, so he checked the code against the draw himself.

The win was made public at the end of March 2025. He and his wife Gemma, a teaching assistant, planned to buy their first home. Prizes can be claimed for 180 days after the draw, so it is worth checking old tickets.

Sources

• Swansea Bay News: Dad drove around for four months with £1M EuroMillions ticket in car (swanseabaynews.com)
• Pembrokeshire Herald: Dad drove for months with £1m winning ticket (pembrokeshire-herald.com)
• Good News Network: Dad drove around with £1M lottery ticket in his car for 4 months (goodnewsnetwork.org)