Police work to complete stolen football cash investigation

Police are tying up all the loose ends in the investigation into more than $25,500 in cash and checks that were stolen from the Scotts Valley office of Harbor High School football coach Travis Rebbert in August.
Scotts Valley Police detectives have determined a suspect and plan to request a warrant from the Santa Cruz County District Attorney’s Office for his arrest by the end of the week.
“We have one extra follow-up (interview), but we’re not going to delay the case because of one thing,” Lt. John Wilson said Monday.
Sgt. Jayson Rutherford conducted the investigation and informed Wilson the report will be submitted to the DA’s office by the end of the week, Wilson said. Then it’s up the DA to determine if an arrest warrant will be granted.
“You can be assured that we did everything we possibly could, including search warrants and interviews,” Wilson said. “We pretty much pulled out all stops on this one to get this information.”
As part of the investigation, Wilson said, police interviewed the man who they believe committed the crime, but cannot give any more detail about the investigation for fear of tipping the suspect off.
Wilson said the case has been a comprehensive one because there was no surveillance tape and very little physical evidence of the crime.
Rebbert took a polygraph test that may have helped clear him as a suspect.
The money – a summer’s worth of fundraised cash and checks – was stolen from the first-year head coach’s office at Jim Leonard’s Home Mortgage Connection sometime during the night of Tuesday, Aug. 25, or the next day.
There was no sign of forced entry and the money was stolen from an unlocked desk drawer in his office.
Rebbert, a 1996 San Lorenzo Valley High graduate, also coached at Scotts Valley High School as quarterbacks coach for a few years.