Former UNLV cops acquitted in fraud case

Monday, Oct. 11, 2004 | 11:04 a.m.

A Clark County jury returned a not-guilty verdict Friday against two former UNLV police officers accused of falsifying their time sheets.

The Nevada attorney general's office had charged William Mason Sr. and Brian Keith Dias with fraudulent presentation of a claim to a public officer, a gross misdemeanor.

Mason and Dias, former sergeants in the UNLV police department, said they had claimed the additional hours as part of an unwritten flex-time policy that allowed officers to make up extra hours worked on one shift by taking time off from another.

Mason, Dias or their lawyer could not be reached for comment.

Senior Deputy Attorney General Brian Kunzi, the prosecutor on the case, alleged the two would cover for each other while working the night shift so one could go home early.

This presented a public safety issue one August night in 2001, when a campus rape was reported and only one officer was on duty to respond, Kunzi said.

Kunzi said it was difficult to convince the jury that what the officers did amounted to criminal behavior.

"A not-guilty verdict really doesn't say that what they did was acceptable," Kunzi said. "I think it was just a question of, (since) they had lost their jobs, was it fair to then put a criminal conviction on top of that?"

Kunzi said the not-guilty verdict would have no effect on their civil cases against the University and Community College System of Nevada.

Both Mason and Dias filed a wrongful termination lawsuit against UNLV and the university prior to the filing of the criminal charges. A state hearing master upheld their dismissals in 2002, and the officers are appealing the decision to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Dias is also part of a three-officer suit against UNLV and the university system that alleges the officers' civil rights were violated and that they were wrongly fired after taking part in a March 2000 campus drug raid.

Dias, Ron Cuzze and Terence Jenkinson allege that UNLV administrators vilified them and accused them of conducting an unauthorized raid in order to avoid public scrutiny. Attorneys on both sides vacated the March trial date and no new activity has occurred since.