2 Officers Win Long Battle for Their Jobs : Law enforcement: Maywood policemen who were active in contract talks are reinstated more than a year after their firing.

Officers Darin Moeller and Albert Rusas were well-steeped in the dangers of police work. But their careers were not cut short on the streets of Maywood. They say the fall came when they tried to traverse the minefield of department politics.

Admittedly outspoken in their roles as the head of the Maywood Police Department’s officers association, they complained loudly and often about working conditions on the 34-member force and were involved in rancorous contract negotiations with city administrators.

They were still stunned, however, when they found themselves brought up on charges of using excessive force and falsifying police reports by their own supervisor, especially since none of the alleged battery victims filed complaints.

But now, more than a year after they were fired by the city for allegedly being overzealous in breaking up a late-night party and then lying to cover their actions, the men are preparing to return to the beat next week. The county Civil Service Commission, upholding an administrative law judge’s earlier finding, ruled last week that there was no justification for their firing, and ordered the officers reinstated with full back pay.

“I’ll never feel fully vindicated,” said Moeller. “How can somebody give you back a year of your life?”

Although the judge said there was insufficient evidence that the officers engaged in any misconduct, the chief of police and the attorney for the city maintain that it was a case where two overly aggressive officers beat the system.

“I would do the same thing again,” said Police Chief Ted Heidke, who fired the officers in January, 1991, after a lengthy Internal Affairs investigation. “If some cop does something wrong, you can’t ignore it because then the whole structure collapses. And they did something seriously wrong.”

What began as a routine call to break up a loud party early on Nov. 3, 1990, ended with the officers under investigation for allegedly beating two party-goers and improperly charging one gang member for being under the influence of PCP.

In what the officers’ lawyers termed a “curious bit of timing,” the charges came several months after they were part of the police association’s contract negotiating team that was involved in acrimonious talks with the city. The talks reached an impasse, and the two officers had a falling out with another member of their bargaining team--the sergeant who later launched the investigation.

In addition, two weeks after the contract talks were completed, the officers said they were transferred to different work shifts.

“It was always an anti-union case,” said the officers’ attorney, Sylvia E. Kellison. “They were very vocal as the association’s officers and that did not sit well with some other officers and people in the administration.”

In the 15 court hearings that took place after the officers were fired, city officials maintained it was a simple case of police misconduct. According to Heidke, the charges of political retribution for Moeller’s and Rusas’ involvement in the police union was “nothing more than a smoke screen.”

According to court documents, the officers arrived at a “wake” for a slain member of the Maywood Boyz gang, and when several of the gang members refused to disperse, Moeller, Rusas and other officers at the scene began moving them from the back yard of a home. The supervising sergeant said Rusas pushed one gang member to the ground and then kicked him several times, although Rusas testified that he fell over the man.

Shortly after, one gang member who had threatened Moeller and other officers during a previous arrest began walking toward Moeller with a beer bottle in his hand and started swearing at him, according to court documents.

Moeller, a four-year veteran, testified that he pushed the man to the ground. When the gang member got up, he came at the officer. Moeller testified that he struck the man once with his police baton on the back of the head, although his sergeant said he hit him several times. Another officer testified he did not see any baton blows struck.

The sergeant helped handcuff the man, whom Rusas and Moeller arrested for being under the influence of PCP. The man refused to give blood or urine samples at the hospital, so there was no evidence of drug use. City officials later claimed the PCP charge was trumped up by the officers to justify their use of excessive force.

In December, nearly a year after they were fired, administrative law judge Glean A. Sunness ruled that there was not enough evidence to conclude that the officers used excessive force or falsified records and said that they should promptly be returned to their jobs.

But the officers say nothing will heal the pain of having their reputations tarnished and their police careers abruptly interrupted.

At the time he was fired, Moeller, 26, had one infant and his wife was pregnant. Rusas, 31, was engaged to be married. Both men say they suffered financial hardship. All they ever wanted to be was cops, they say, and they wondered if they would ever put on a uniform again.

“The whole thing was devastating,” said Rusas, who patrolled the streets of Maywood for five years before his firing. “Once you are fired from a job as a police officer, your credibility is ruined. It was especially bad since I knew we didn’t do anything wrong.”

Heidke said he will recommend that the two officers return to work sometime next week.

“Both these guys are good cops,” Heidke said. “But they know that if they screw up and I catch them, they’ll be in hot water again.”