Departing Moose still
can't profit from book?
Chief quit to make money on mass-murder, but ethics board might kill his payment
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Posted: June 19, 2003
1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Paul Sperry
© 2003 WorldNetDaily.com
ROCKVILLE, Md. – Leaving office may not be enough for Montgomery County Police Chief Charles Moose to shake ethics laws and profit from his book deal, officials here say.
Publishing confidential information about the Beltway sniper case could put in jeopardy any money Moose makes from his 336-page tome, "Three Weeks in October: The Manhunt for the Serial Sniper."
County ethics laws bar employees from not only profiting from the prestige of their office, but also from disclosing confidential government information.
The confidentiality provision applies to both current and former employees, a Montgomery County Ethics Commission official told WorldNetDaily.
"We'll have to wait until the book comes out, and then the commission can take a look at it and the public can take a look at, and either the commission on its own or a member of the public can file a complaint if they think he has violated the confidentiality provision," the official said.
Moose's resignation, effective June 28, "does not moot the case," he asserted.
What's more, Moose will have to give up any money he received for outside deals while he was a county employee, including a $4,250 movie option fee he pocketed earlier this year.
But that's not all.
"He may be liable for any monies he receives after leaving for work he did while he was a county employee that violated the prestige-of-office provision," the county official said.
The commission will have to review the outside work Moose did as a county employee, he said, "and see if they will need to go after all or part of his earnings."
In a closed hearing before the five-member panel in March, Moose admitted already working on a few chapters with writer Charles Fleming.
He stands to make $170,000 in just advance money from New York-based Dutton Publishing Inc. That does not include royalties from sales.
It's not clear if Moose will now drop his First Amendment lawsuits against the ethics commission. Moose's lawyer, Ronald Karp, did not return phone calls.
During the March hearing, commissioner Steven Shaw asked Moose if he planned to reveal sensitive information about the sniper investigation, such as telephone conversations with other law enforcement officials.
Moose testily replied: "Again, I came here to ask permission to work. I didn't come here to ask you to approve the literary, you know, form."
But the next week, in a letter he and his lawyer drafted to the panel, he offered to let at least his immediate supervisor review his manuscript for breaches.
"I would be more than happy to submit the drafts of any books or screenplays to the chief administrative officer in Montgomery County to assure that breaches of confidentiality do not occur," he said in the March 10 letter obtained by WorldNetDaily.
"As you may know," he cautioned, "there were approximately 2,000 individuals involved in the sniper investigation, and I alone cannot possibly assure you that no breaches of confidentiality will ever occur."
In his March 3 testimony, he assured the panel he wouldn't write "something that's gonna ruin the trial."
But police chiefs and prosecutors in neighboring counties where the sniper suspects will be first tried warn that Moose's book could jeopardize their cases. Lawyers for sniper defendants John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo also have expressed concerns. The book is scheduled for release in October, when Muhammad's trial starts. Malvo's trial begins the next month.
Moose argues there's no guarantee the trials will take place as scheduled.
"They could die in prison. They could flee," he said of Muhammad and Malvo. "Any number of things could happen" between now and the book's release.
Bruce Romer is the chief administrative officer who served as Moose's immediate supervisor under County Executive Douglas Duncan, who hired Moose in 1999. Both endorsed Moose's outside ventures.
Only, they belatedly asked the ethics commission for the necessary waivers for them.
Page 2 of Moose's "Employment Agreement," signed July 6, 1999, clearly states: "Employee understands that in accordance with the Montgomery County Public Ethics Law, employee will need to obtain the consent of the Montgomery County Ethics Commission before engaging in outside employment."
Yet it wasn't until March 3 of this year that Moose formally requested the waivers. And he didn't ask for one or two, but five – all for money-making ventures he'd already started, including a teaching gig at Montgomery College, a National Guard job, the book deal, the movie deal and a crisis consulting business he started with his wife just four weeks after the snipers were caught.
Montgomery County Ethics Commission Vice Chairman Jerome Joseph was not amused.
"I would have preferred that you come in with one or two requests for outside employment instead of five," he told Moose.
"We did not bring those applications [for waivers] to you in a timely manner," Moose admitted in his closed-door testimony.
Sandy Herman-Moose, testifying alongside her husband as "his lawyer" (though she's not licensed to practice), told the panel she was angry to learn he was not in compliance with ethics rules.
General Moose?
"Now, I am told that on issue one with you, he didn't get the waivers properly," she said. "That's a given. He says so. I want to kick his butt for that, OK?"
But she says Romer approved his teaching and National Guard jobs when he was hired, because she recalled telling him that her husband was "on track to be a general."
"When we talked to Mr. Romer, about coming here, there was no mincing of words – my husband's a teacher, he's taught [in Portland, Ore.], and he's a police chief," she said. "And he is in the Air National Guard, and they have him on a track to be a general, because if you look outside of Washington, D.C., there aren't even very many black generals, especially those with Ph.D.s, OK?"
It's not clear if Moose, who did not return phone calls from Andrews Air Force Base where he's on active duty, still plans to donate a portion of the proceeds from his book and movie deals to charity.
"My plan is to set up a charitable foundation with a full board of directors, where a portion of the proceeds from my book, film or other private endeavors will be deposited for the purpose of assisting victims of violence," he vowed in his March 10 letter to the ethics board.
As WorldNetDaily first reported, Moose's wife complained to the ethics board that a life in public service has deprived her of household luxuries such as antiques. Moose, who drives a BMW, groused about his wife's and stepson's law school bills.
He also argued he should be allowed to supplement his $160,000-plus salary – the highest among county officials (excluding the school superintendent) and Maryland police chiefs – with outside contracts, because he makes less than the new chief of the Atlanta Police Department.
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