A MAN who won half of a £22million lottery jackpot says it ruined his life as pals turned on him and investments went sour.
Mark Gardiner, from Hastings, won £22,590,829 with his mate in 1995 and on the outside it would appear he is living the life of luxury.
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The glazier hasn’t frittered his winnings away and owns two houses in Barbados and has an Aston Martin, a Harley-Davidson and two Mercedes in his garage.
He’s also bought two football clubs, a £750,000 cruiser and a second boat and put millions of pounds into businesses.
When he and pal Paul Maddison won the huge fortune, Mark thought his problems would disappear overnight but despite his wealth he regrets winning in many ways.
Mark said in 2005: “There are days when I curse my win and wish I’d never got involved.
“But I guess if I woke up one day and saw my rusty old van and bank loan and realised I’d dreamt all this up that would be pretty frightening, too.”
He has been married four times and split with his fourth wife Brenda in 2004 and has vowed never to get married again.
Mark said: “I’ve fallen out with the lot of them. I’ve hired the top barristers in London to deal with my divorce from Brenda.”
He jokingly added that he was allergic to wedding cake.
Mark is only in contact with two relatives, his cousin June and Uncle Jim.
His three sisters and his mothers – both his biological one and the one who adopted him – are no longer part of his life.
The only piece of jewellery he wears is a cheap signet ring his sister found at a bus depot when he was just 14.
Looking back, Mark said: “We had good times once.”
Speaking to the Daily Mail about his investments in the football clubs, he said they were a “complete waste of money”.
Mark said: “The clubs were never going to be profitable and, even though I had poured money into them, nobody was willing to help, so I put them both into administration.”
There are days when I curse my win and wish I’d never got involved.
Lottery winner Mark Gardiner
Mark is also no longer in touch with Paul, at one time his best mate and business partner, who he shared the winning lottery ticket with.
Paul now reportedly lives as a virtual recluse in a six-bedroom mansion in Scotland, having wed the woman he hired to clean it.
Mark’s not seen him since Paul failed to turn up to his wedding to Brenda in 1996.
He now only has a small group of friends he trusts.
Mark said: “I spent £500,000 buying five friends houses when I won. Do you think they are still my friends? Like hell.
“Not one speaks to me. Having so much money has made me suspicious of people’s intentions. It’s horrible, but when someone’s being nice then it does cross my mind what they are up to.”
He was initially bombarded with begging letters, which he says came by the “sack load”, detailing people’s horror stories.
But Mark said worse than those were the “green-eyed monsters” who he said were out to get him.
He claimed that he has been sued “more times than I can remember,” adding that people wanted to have a pop at him because of his wealth.
Mark said: “Sometimes I think it would have been better to have won a much smaller amount. I love going somewhere where no one knows me and I can be a normal person.”
He does though recognise winning so much money does have its upsides too.
Speaking to Good Morning Britain, he said: “I had to arrange some emergency healthcare and it was that great feeling that you can pick the phone up and organise the best hospital and healthcare for your relatives.
Perhaps biggest of all though is Mark’s sense of regret and described himself at the time of the win as being “just a puppy” and didn’t know what to do as he lacked experience.
He said: “If I could get in the Tardis I would chuck the old Mark Gardiner away and replace him with who I am now. A man with a lot of experience.”
When they won, Mark said he “did a really stupid thing” by giving the ticket to Paul who went to the shop to verify it.
As the shopkeeper was congratulating him on his win, a guy in the queue who knew them both nipped out to phone the papers, which was when “all hell broke loose”.
To keep himself grounded Mark still goes to work every day at his firm, Croft Glass, and he seems to get genuine pleasure from his work.
He said: “What can be better than someone saying, ‘Thanks. You’ve done a lovely job on my windows.’
“Now, if my money could buy comments like that I’d be a poor man because I’d buy them all the time.”
Mark still plays the lottery and said to win the jackpot twice would be “amazing” as “you need money for a rainy day”.
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