When Herbert Starbird looked at the numbers on his October bank statement, he knew something was wrong. Very wrong.
His checking account with First Commonwealth Bank showed an Oct. 23 deposit of $280,276.76. The Altoona retiree said he knew the staggering amount of money didn't belong to him, or to his wife, Becky, so he called the bank -- several times -- to report the mistake, his attorney said.
Starbird's attorney said the bank assured his client more than once that everything was in order, that the deposit was accurate, that all was OK with his account. So, Starbird and his wife began to spend their unexpected windfall, thinking that an anonymous benefactor had given them an awesome gift of free money.

They said they'd heard about things like that before, on TV. But their dream come true has evolved into a nightmare with a plot twist normally reserved for bad movies. The bank discovered its mistake and this week sued the Starbirds in Blair County Court to recover $157,206.12 they've spent.
The bank wants them to pay interest on the money and legal fees.
"This lawsuit might actually help my client if it goes to trial with a jury of his peers," said Thomas Dickey of Altoona, Starbird's attorney. "He called the bank a couple of times to give the money back, and they told him it was his. It took them four months to say 'oops,' and in the meantime, he was spending money on legitimate things.
"Now, the bank wants to make money on him by charging him interest."
According to the complaint filed by the bank's attorney, Frederick B. Gieg Jr., of Altoona, the deposit should have gone into the account of another unidentified customer but did not because that customer's account was inactive. The lawsuit offers no explanation as to how the money ended up in Starbird's account.
Gieg did not return two calls seeking comment Thursday. A woman who answered his law office phone indicated he was in the office, but busy with clients.
The lawsuit alleges that Starbird "at no point in time" tried to bring the mistake to the bank's attention. It adds that he and his wife should have known the money did not belong to them.
By the time the bank noticed its error on Feb. 7, the couple had spent $163,330.37, the lawsuit states. The bank recovered $102,935.48 that remained in Starbird's checking account and took $14,010.91 from his savings account, according to the lawsuit.
The bank made the correct deposit into the account of the unnamed "innocent customer" who should have received it in the first place, the lawsuit explained.
According to a Web site for First Commonwealth Financial Corp., the corporation formed in 1982 was registered as a bank with headquarters in Indiana County. First Commonwealth Bank branches are located in 15 Western Pennsylvania counties in dozens of cities and small towns, including Pittsburgh, Greensburg and Altoona.
First Commonwealth's most recent quarterly report listed assets of $6 billion.
Dickey, who was meeting with Starbird late yesterday afternoon, said his client first called him for advice in February when the bank noticed its error. He said Starbird paid some of the money back.
"He was trying to work with them and make payments in good faith, but apparently the bank wasn't getting the money quickly enough and filed a lawsuit," Dickey said. "The question is, how do you pay it back? They're talking about putting a mortgage on their house, but then they'll have to deal with interest costs."
The lawsuit states that the bank received a payment of $624.25 from Starbird's frozen account. It indicates that Starbird repaid an additional $5,500 on March 25.
"He's a good person by heart. There's nothing criminal here," Dickey said.
"A jury could come back and say it was a gift."