Columbia Falls woman wins $25,000

A woman in Columbia Falls recently won a $25,000 top Scratch prize from the Montana Lottery.

Trisha Fauth was playing “Frogger” with a ticket purchased at Town Pump in Columbia Falls.

A regular Powerball player, Fauth said she also buys one Scratch ticket a month and this is her first big Lottery win.

When she scratched away to reveal a $25,000 win on Saturday, Oct. 19, she couldn’t believe her eyes or her luck.

“I thought I had to be reading it wrong,” she said.

Fauth took her winning ticket back to Town Pump and had them double check it was a winner. It was.

“The whole store freaked out, too,” she said.

Before she bought her winning ticket, Fauth and her family put a down payment on a new car. They plan to pay the car off with her Lottery winnings.

The Montana Lottery was created by referendum in 1986. Since then, it has paid out more than $459 million in prizes and returned more than $204 million to the state.