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A young lottery winner who bagged a $200k (£168k) jackpot said he "doesn't know why" he bought the ticket while shopping for snacks.

Cody Plemmons, 18 from Arden, North Carolina, had only entered the lottery twice before and hadn't been planning on purchasing a third ticket when he stopped at a petrol station in Marshall, NC, on his way to Tennessee.

Plemmons told North Carolina Education Lottery officials he was more focused on picking up food for the road and made the decision to buy a scratch card on a whim, Dunya News reported.

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"We mainly stopped at the gas station for a drink and a snack," he said.

"I honestly don t even know why I got one," he added. "I just thought, Why not."

Not expecting much, Plemmons was thrilled when he scratched off the impressive sum.

"I couldn't believe it when I won," Plemmons said. "This is only the third lottery ticket I've ever bought."

Plemmons has decided to stash away his prize money in savings – a wise decision, according to four-time lottery winner Mike Luciano who recently told the Daily Star about the pitfalls of suddenly coming into money.

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"Winning money in the lottery obviously is very helpful, it helps the family, helps you get that little break in life. But there’s also drawbacks to winning money," Luciano told us.

"The hardest thing with winning money is, you know, you have to control your spending habits.

"Winning a lot of money like that isn’t as much money as you think, it can go pretty fast, and you have to be careful."

While Plemmons has only entered three lottery draws in his life, Luciano has won big on four separate occasions in 25 years and admits to being "addicted to jackpots".

His first win was in 1999, which saw him bag an impressive $100k (£82k).

The 55-year-old bar owner has since won an eye-watering $3m (£2.47m) in 2016 and $500k (£412k) from the Pennsylvania state lottery in the US last year before bagging a $1m (£823k) jackpot on January 6 last year.

"It’s always great when you win, but it’s a very troubling thing when you win a couple of hundred dollars and that’s your paycheck," he warned.

"There are people that do that.

"I’ve had four lottery wins, which is pretty incredible, but that’s not what happens to everyone."

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• Money
• National Lottery
• Teenagers

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