Cache and carried away

METHUEN, Mass. -- They were bouncing between appearances on "Good Morning America" and CNN and fielding nonstop calls from reporters. Tim Crebase and Barry Billcliff's story of finding buried cash in a friend's yard was a media sensation, and they were happy participants.

If only they weren't so talkative, they might have gotten away with stealing a fortune, police said.

Police said the duo's whole story about digging up the treasure was concocted to cover up the theft of the antique bills, valued at $125,000, from a home where they worked as roofers.

"Had they kept quiet ... they probably could have sold the money and no one would have ever known," Methuen police chief Joseph Solomon said. "It just got away from them. Sort of like the snowball rolls down the hill and it keeps going and crushes you."

The owners of the home didn't know the stash was there, Solomon said. And the bills are so rare and demand from collectors so strong that a quiet, lucrative transaction would have been easy.

Billcliff, 27, of Manchester, N.H., and Crebase, 24, of Methuen, Mass., pleaded not guilty after being arrested on charges of receiving stolen property, conspiracy and accessory after the fact. Warrants were issued for Kevin Kozak, 27, of Methuen, and Matt Ingham, 23, of Newton, N.H., on the same charges.

Investigators said Crebase confessed under questioning. Crebase said he, Billcliff and Ingham -- all roofers -- found the money stuffed in rusting tin cans in the gutter of a barn they were hired to repair, and persuaded Kozak to go along with their story, authorities said. In his alleged confession, Crebase said Ingham planned to use proceeds to fund his rock band.

Investigators said they are not convinced it was found in a barn. They said it might have been taken from the barn owners' house. Solomon said most of the currency was recovered, but some was probably already sold.

Under Massachusetts law, "when you're working on my house and you find it on my property, you've got to tell me," the police chief said.

Lawyers for Billcliff and Crebase said the men were sticking to their story of finding the box while digging under a tree in the back yard of a house Crebase rented from Kozak in the town of Methuen.

'No crime'

Billcliff's attorney, Alexander Cain, said, "There is no evidence, none, that my client committed any crime."

The cache included 1,800 bank notes and bills dating from 1899 to 1928. The currency had a face value of about $7,000, but prosecutors said the men had been offered $125,000 by a collector.

Police received an anonymous call on Tuesday from a woman who said the story the men had been telling was a lie, according to court papers.

They interviewed neighbors who said they had not seen anyone digging in the yard. And a coin shop owner who examined the money told investigators the men gave him conflicting accounts of how they found it.

Police also noticed that the money appeared to be in remarkably good condition for being buried a foot below ground through decades of New England weather.

In addition, the men gave conflicting reasons for digging in Crebase's yard. They told one reporter they were preparing to plant a tree. In other reports, they said they were trying to remove a small tree or dig up the roots of a shrub that was damaging the home's foundation.

Even Billcliff's name was the subject of confusion. He complained that some media had misspelled it Villcliff, but told The Boston Globe that he had given the wrong spelling so that people would not come looking for him.

The arrests of Billcliff and Crebase forced the cancellation of an appearance Thursday night on ABC's "Jimmy Kimmel Live" because they were being booked by police around the time the show was airing. They were to have been interviewed from the yard where they claimed to have dug up the money.

Solomon said the motive for calling the media about their find may have been to push up the price of the loot or publicize Ingham's rock band, which they mentioned in several interviews.

Crebase enthusiastically took all calls, and told one reporter how much he was enjoying the attention.

"It's all spectacular," Crebase said Wednesday. "I'm so beside myself, I don't know what to think."

Solomon said it doesn't appear the men planned to seek broad exposure, but when the national media came calling, they couldn't refuse.

"It just got out of hand," he said.