VALLEY CENTER ---- For Stanley Czapiewski, sixty pennies went a long way this week.
The semi-retired businessman from Escondido took a 60-cent spin on the penny slots at Valley View Casino late Wednesday night, and moments later won the casino's largest Colossal Jackpot: $733,501.59.
On Friday morning, with television and newspaper
The loot was escorted into one of the event rooms at the casino's hotel by three armed guards, one with the metal suitcase handcuffed to his wrist.
"I'm not usually at a loss for words, but I am like, 'Wow,'" Czapiewski said, sitting beside his wife Sabrina, his eyes welling up in tears.
Casino manager Bruce Howard handed over the winnings as cameras flashed.
"I got a bit of loose change for you," he joked.
Czapiewski said he has been a regular at Valley View since it opened in 2001, and that although he owns a house in Vancouver, Canada, he and his wife call Escondido home.
He is not sure what he'll do with his new "life-changing money" just yet.
"We just bought a new home, so we can buy something for the house. I think my wife's ready for a new car," he said, putting his arms around his wife. "I won a billion when I got Sabrina. Maybe we'll get a few more rocks for her fingers."
The couple described themselves as self-employed and conservative.
"This will help us retire," she said.
As for work, Czapiewski said he does "a little bit of everything in sales."
Howard said it's the casino's largest slot machine payout. All of the casino's slot machines feed into the Colossal Jackpot for specific amounts of money between $10,000 and $1 million. So far, more than 50 gamblers have won when their bets hit those mysterious figures, selected randomly by the machine, according to Howard.
"It's all luck," Howard said. "It just happened to be his day, his time. It can happen to anyone."
The Colossal Jackpot is paid out in cash, not in an annuities fund similar to what is offered at other casinos.
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