A man from Guardamangia scooped €23,000 in the past week after winning two prizes in the same draw of the VAT receipts lottery. He won over €11,000 each time.
Held once a month, the VAT Lottery attracts thousands of hopefuls to send in millions of receipts.
According to statistician Silvan Zammit, who was asked by The Sunday Times of Malta to work the odds of this feat, even if the punter in question submitted as many as 10,000 receipts, which is highly unlikely, his chances of winning twice in the same draw are a mere 0.005 per cent.
If he submitted a more realistic 1,000 receipts, the chances of a double draw happening go down to 0.000006 per cent.
The calculation was made on the basis of an estimated 2.8 million receipts that were drawn from in the June draw.
Prospects are ‘very unlikely’
The receipts are not actually counted but are weighed and the number of receipts is extrapolated the basis of a kilo sample.
Dr Zammit cautioned that chance is unpredictable and although probabilities may be slim, it could happen that someone wins twice in a row, but the prospect remains “very unlikely”.
Asked whether the win had raised any suspicions, a spokesman for the Finance Ministry, which is responsible for the VAT Department, pointed out that it had happened before and as far as the department was concerned the draw that took place on June 17 was in line with normal procedure.
The other time a person won twice in the same draw was in April 2012. However, in that case, the prize money was €233.
This is the first time, the spokesman said, that a double winner took home the biggest prize on both wins.
He also pointed out that there were instances where the same person won multiple times in different draws.
However, in 2003, 11 people were charged with tampering the VAT lottery over a year between June 2002 and October 2003.
Three of those arraigned were public officials with the Public Lotto Department, which oversees the lottery.
During the hearings, prosecutors explained how the public officials would clip chosen receipts to the inside of the hinges of the urn used to draw the receipt so they would be able to pick up the chosen tickets while keeping up the pretence that procedure was being followed.
The scheme was foiled when police discovered one of the illicit dealings between the officials and a ‘punter’ which led to all 11 being charged with involvement in the scam.
Two of the defendants were found guilty and each sentenced to two years in prison, suspended for four years, fined €1,000 each and interdicted for life.
The other official was acquitted and later reinstated in the Department of Lotto due to insufficient evidence.