Borders and Coastguard officers share big lottery win

The men and women of the Association of Borders and Coastguards Officers (ABCO) have donated part of their big summer lottery win to the Gibraltar Alzheimer's & Dementia Society (GADS).

The association members donated an amount equal to what they all received individually.
The ABCO syndicate is made up of 99 members and the prize was £250,000.

“We divided the prize by 100 and decided that one that was left over we would donate to a charity,” Nathan Yome, treasurer of the ABCO said.

The decision to give it to GADS came after all members were approached and asked which charity would they like to see benefit from the donation.

Both members of ABCO and GADS picked up their cheques yesterday afternoon from the shop that sold the ticket Baustista.

There was a delay of a couple of weeks between the lottery draw and the actual members becoming aware they were lottery winners.

“I came here [to Baustista’s] and bought the lottery. I put in it a drawer at home and I went away on holiday. I came back and looked up my personal numbers and I then went to the drawer and realised I hadn’t even looked at those tickets yet. But that was a week before,” said Mr Yome.

“I put them in my bag and carried them around for about a week in my bag”, he added.
Eventually he managed to go to the shop at a time it was open and found out the syndicate had won.

Mr Yome has spent his win on skates and a holiday to London where he will see some shows and take his son to a football game.

Most of the other association members have also spend their winnings on things such as holidays or items for their family.

Not everyone who works within the Borders and Coastguards Agency are part of the association, about 15 officers are not. This meant that some members found it hard to celebrate somewhat when some of their fellow colleagues had missed out.

Collecting the cheque on behalf of ABCO was Nathan Yome, Karensa Chipol, Daniel Robinson, Geraldine Bear and Belinda Porter.

Daphne Alcantara, the chairwoman of the Gibraltar Alzheimer's and Dementia Society and committee member Dick Barton received the cheque on behalf of GADS.

Mr Barton commented that he was amazed at the generosity of ABCO in a time of jubilation and he was delighted they selected GADS to receive the money.

ASCO has already this year donated over £6,000 to different charities on the Rock.
John Paul Bautista, owner of the shop where the ticket was sold, said it is the first time they have had such a large group winning the lottery.

“We have normally shared the prize between ten or 15 people but having it shared between 100 people has never been heard of,” he said.