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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
World
Charlie Jones

Lottery winner who bagged $27MILLION ended up living in shed covered in poo 5 years later

A man who won $27million on the lottery ended up blowing all the money in just five years and living in a shed covered in poo.

David Lee Edwards was a convicted felon from Ashland, Kentucky, but struck lucky when he won a quarter-share of the Powerball $280 million jackpot in August 2001.

It was one of the biggest lottery wins in history but by 2006 all of Mr Edwards' money was gone.

The first thing Mr Edwards did after winning big was to marry his girlfriend Shawna Maddux in Malibu, California.

Then the two set out to spend the money.

Just some of the lavish purchases included a mansion in a gated community, a private jet and more than a dozen expensive cars.

But the over-spending and drug addiction took their toll.

David Lee Edwards with his wife Shawna Maddux (David Lee Edwards)

By 2006, Mr Edwards and Ms Maddux were penniless and living in a storage shed, allegedly covered in human faeces, it was reported at the time.

Ms Maddux soon left and re-married. She and her new husband eventually took Mr Edwards in before finding a space for him in a hospice.

The hard living had taken its toll and in 2013 Mr Edwards died aged just 58.

By the end of his life he had gone through all the winnings and even owed others thousands.

David Lee Edwards had multiple run ins with the police before and after his big win (Palm Beach Garden Police)

When you look at what he had brought, it gets easier to see how that fortune disappeared.

Firstly there was the $1.6 million mansion, a 6,000-square-foot monster in a gated community in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.

The mansion clearly wasn't enough because Edwards bought another house nearby for $600,000.

He blew another £1m on luxury cars including a $90,000 Dodge Viper and a $200,000 Lamborghini Diablo.

But the most expensive luxury was a $1.9 million private LearJet.

Edwards left with his daughter Tiffani in 2010 (David Lee Edwards)

Hoping to invest, he also spent another $4.5million on a fibre optics installation company and a limo business.

He even paid half a million to another ex-wife and her husband over custody of Edwards' then-teenage daughter, Tiffani.

According to estimates, he had spent $3 million of his $27 million just three months after getting the winning ticket and a further $12 million in the first year.

This is a huge difference to what he said he would do with the money.

David Lee Edwards in the mansion he bought (Supplied)

"You know, a lot of people, they're out of work. Doesn't have hardly anything," he said at the time.

"And so I didn't want to accept this money by saying I'm going to get mansions and I'm going to get cars, I'm going to do this and that. I would like to accept it with humility."

"I want this money to last, for me, for my future wife, for my daughter, and future generations," he continued.

In the years before his death, Mr Edwards had multiple run-ins with the law over possession of illegal drugs including crack cocaine.

He even contracted hepatitis from the use of intravenous needles.

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