£9 million Lotto win was a joke, say Harrow brothers

Harrow old boys Alex and Seb Cater boasted of their jackpot on a website and called for attractive women to share in their fortune.

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They wrote: "Thanks to EuroMillions we're now rich. Who wants to board the money train? Fitties only!"

In a Facebook Internet group entitled 'Who wants to marry the Cater brothers now we're millionaires?', Seb, 19, was described as 'the Money Machine' and Alex, 20, as the 'treasurer'.

Word of the 'win' swept Harrow's campus in North-West London, where the brothers were until recently boarders, and scores of women flocked to visit the web page.

Many observers commented that the former public schoolboys were probably less in need of a win than most punters.

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The brothers' wealthy father, Richard Cater, was a senior figure in the Cathay Pacific airline before becoming a chief operating officer of Air Hong Kong. He could not be contacted for comment yesterday.

Alex Cater, now a business student at an offshoot of Durham University, was anxious to play down any talk of riches.

He blamed his younger brother for starting the whole thing, saying: "We didn't win the money - it was a joke between us and our friends and it's got completely out of hand.

"It wasn't supposed to be public, just within a group of friends. I don't know why my brother set up that website, but it's my responsibility as well."

Seb was not answering calls. Alex, who was born in Japan to his English mother, Carolyn, left Harrow two years ago and travelled around the world on a gap year before starting university.

He visited Fiji, Thailand, Japan, and Australia, making a host of friends he has since kept in touch with on the Bebo website, where he says his favourite hobby is 'chilling with friends'.

Those friends describe him as a 'player' much in demand from girls even before he claimed to have £9 million to spare.

Yesterday Alex's gap-year friend Camilla Kerr, of Shepton Mallet in Somerset, said: "I met Alex in Thailand and I know he and his brother are both funny boys - they're jokers.'

A friend at Durham University's Stevenson College in Stocktonon-Tees said: "Alex plays up front for the Stevenson College football first team. He's a bit of a diver.

"They are pretty well off so wouldn't need a lottery win as much as most people anyway.

"And Alex has a girlfriend who might be struggling to see the funny side of this prank."

Seb, who was born in Bangkok, left Harrow a year after his brother. At the school he distinguished himself by visiting local pensioners and helping the homeless.

He raised £1,500 towards a new homelessness project, and wrote in the Harrow school magazine that meeting the poor had been 'the most fulfilling experience' of his public school life.

When not studying, or boasting of winning the lottery, the brothers split their time between Cornwall, where their mother comes from, and Sydney, where their father is honorary president of North Bondi Surf Life-Saving Club.

Mr Cater senior worked for many years at Cathay Pacific, rising to regional general manager before moving on to a senior role at sister freight company Air Hong Kong three years ago.

Harrow school was unwilling to be drawn on the affair.

Spokesman Kirsty Shanahan said: "There is no involvement. They are Old Harrovians. One left last year and one the year before."