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I DON'T GIVE A JOT
Lotto winner who blew his £7.5m fortune insists that he’s happy in Grimsby semi
A LOTTO winner who blew his £7.5million jackpot insists that he’s never been happier.
Roy Gibney, 64, quit his sprawling mansion after a bitter marriage split.
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The former sheet metal worker has now found love again and is renovating a five-bed semi in his home town of Grimsby.
Roy declared: “It’s been one heck of a ride — some of it good, some of it bad. I’m the happiest I’ve ever been.”
Roy scooped £7.5million in July 1998 and splashed out on a six-bedroom mansion.
The 25 acre property, in Barnoldby-le-Beck, Lincs, came with its own fishing lake.
Roy added a 50ft indoor swimming pool with his winning numbers 12, 13, 21, 23, 33 and 36 tiled into the bottom.
He also spent £50,000 on racehorse Red Lion, bought new motors with personal number plates and travelled the world.
But Roy’s high-rolling lifestyle ended after splitting from his second wife, Darlene Shand, 45, in 2014. By then his property portfolio was all but sold off and any money left was swallowed up by the break-up.
Roy moved into a one-bed bungalow in Grimsby he had bought for his mum.
He is now with former flame Tracy Baker, 58, and is renovating their £300,000 home.
I’ve lost money, I’ve been fleeced and now I’m down to tens of thousands
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Roy, the first of three jackpot winners from Grimsby, said: “It was a hell of a lot of money to win 21 years ago. At the start I went at it at a million miles an hour, like you would. I lived the high life and partied.
“I’ve lost money, I’ve been fleeced and now I’m down to tens of thousands in the bank. That mound of money is dwindling all of the time.
“I’m living a more modest lifestyle, it’s calmer, more normal and I’m blissfully happy.
“I’ve got the perfect lady and I’ve come to realise, nearly 21 years after I won the lottery, that there are some things money just can’t buy.
“It can’t buy you happiness. You don’t win the lottery and automatically become happy overnight. Yes you can buy the things you always dreamed of.
“But love is priceless and I wouldn’t swap it for anything.
“People may say I’ve got less now than I did then, but they’re wrong. I’ve got more because I found love.”
Roy, a dad-of-three, was living alone in a £40,000 two-bed home when he won the jackpot. The first thing he did was sell his car to a pal — for a quid.
He then bought a red Lexus LS300, which he still owns, and mansion The Brambles. He spent £500,000 doing it up, adding the swimming pool, a bar, a snooker table, a poker table and roulette table.
I’ve got more because I found love
Roy added: “When the pool was put in, they asked what I wanted on the bottom. I said, ‘I don’t bloody know’. They suggested Roy Gibney, the date and my numbers. I said, ‘slap it in’.
“I was loving it, but I was also targeted by crooks.
“In a lot of ways the lottery win was a blessing but in some ways it was also a curse.” Roy and Darlene met at the races and have a son, Luis, now 12. In their 2015 divorce she got a £350,000 home in Scotland, a car, caravan and £50,000.
Roy kept a £500,000 holiday home they bought in Cyprus.
After returning to Grimsby he rekindled his romance with teaching assistant Tracy.
The pair dated in 2004. The mum-of-two said: “I heard rumours Roy was back in town.
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“People were saying he’d lost all his money, his wife left him and took him for everything.
“I contacted him to see if he was OK and we met up. He’s still the same person. He used to hide himself away because he felt like the world was against him. But now he’s happy and he enjoys life.”
Roy still plays the lottery each week using the same numbers. He vowed: “I’m certain I’ll win it again. But if I do I won’t be telling a soul.”
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