Troy's receipt of benefits actually occured in the previous Spring. The final "official" story from the University as reported by the Dispatch was that Troy went to Robert Baker looking for work in early 2004, when Baker gave him ~$500 as an advance with promises to find Troy a job. One of the attorneys at Baker's company (Poly-Care), was alerted to Baker's hand outs and decided to blow the whistle after the Michigan game once Troy had become a celebrity QB.
So the incident occured sometime in April or May, Troy then played the entire regular season before finally being turned in on Dec 9. His suspension was announced on Dec 20.
Chris Gamble was also named as having a prior connection to Baker/Poly-Care in 2003, but was not found to have broken any rules since he did actually perform work. The term players (plural) was often thrown around in reference to Baker, but I don't recall any being named aside from Gamble and Smith.
Troy took a bullet for the program while Andy Geiger was out cracking skulls.