Drug Charge Dismissed for Former Court Official : Cocaine: A judge finds that the ex-commissioner went ‘far beyond’ the requirements of his diversion program.

A felony cocaine possession charge against former Municipal Court Commissioner Robert K. Tuller Jr. was dismissed Friday after a judge determined that he had gone “far beyond” the requirements of a drug diversion program for first-time offenders.

Tuller, in his first public statement since his arrest last May, said he believes that he is now free of a cocaine problem.

“The Betty Ford Center saved my life,” Tuller said.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Carl W. Armbrust told Municipal Judge James M. Brooks that while he is skeptical of diversion programs, Tuller had met dismissal requirements.

The court requires a defendant to attend at least 26 drug diversion sessions. Tuller’s records show that he has completed 311.

The dismissal clears Tuller’s record and eliminates almost all likelihood that the State Bar of California would take disciplinary action against Tuller, Armbrust said.

Tuller, 47, was arrested May 11, 1990, in an Anaheim hotel room with a vial of cocaine in one hand and a blowtorch in the other. He had bought $100 in cocaine from a police informant, who told police about Tuller several months before.

Less than a month after his arrest, Tuller was forced by the Municipal Court judges in Fullerton to resign his commissioner’s post.

The judges had appointed him in 1986. While judges are appointed by the governor, commissioners are selected by local judges and empowered to help ease court overcrowding by presiding over certain cases.

In August, Santa Ana Municipal Judge Gary P. Ryan offered to dismiss the charge if Tuller successfully completed a drug diversion program, a standard practice for first-time arrests. Besides the Betty Ford Center for drug rehabilitation in Rancho Mirage, Tuller was involved in weekly group therapy sessions at St. Jude Hospital and Rehabilitation Center in Fullerton and Narcotics Anonymous.

Tuller also made a videotape about drug problems that one law school professor wants to use, Judge Brooks was told Friday.

Armbrust had opposed allowing Tuller to enter the diversion program.

“I think if you’re caught possessing an illegal substance, you should be punished,” Armbrust said. “You should go through diversion on your own as well as be punished. . . . Our indication was that he’d sought help in the past but had gone back to cocaine.”

Since resigning from the bench, Tuller has been practicing law on his own. He said Friday that publicity about his drug problems has impaired his ability to build a successful practice but that he is working at it. He declined to discuss his recent bankruptcy.

Tuller said later that he believes that he is a changed man since his arrest but that he is uncertain what lies in his legal future.