One lawsuit claims officers were in a steroid-induced rage when they beat a man. Another accuses a corrections officer of squeezing an inmate’s penis as a means of harassment, then trumping up a disciplinary charge when the inmate complained.

Police officers and corrections officers who received anabolic steroids from Jersey City physician Joseph Colao are named in at least five lawsuits alleging brutality or civil rights violations. Other officers were fired, suspended or arrested for allegedly engaging in bad conduct on or off the job.

Here’s a look at some of the cases:

Bolton v. City of Jersey City et al.

Venue:

U.S. District Court in Newark

Filed:

Aug. 26. 2008

Status:

Both sides agreed to binding arbitration in October 2010; ongoing

In August 2007, Jersey City resident Mathias Bolton called police to report a possible break-in at his apartment building. Bolton, 37, claims the first officer on the scene, Victor Vargas, mistook him for a burglar and, in a rage fueled by steroids, repeatedly punched him, threw him against the wall, dragged him from the building’s vestibule and pushed him down a flight of stairs to the sidewalk.

Other officers, among them Michael Stise, continued to beat Bolton as he lay on the ground, the suit states. The officers charged Bolton with resisting arrest and aggravated assault on a police officer. The counts were later dropped.

Court documents filed in the case show Vargas, 33, and Stise, 30, were taking anabolic steroids and human growth hormone prescribed by Colao. The officers deny in legal papers doing anything wrong, saying they identified themselves and repeatedly ordered Bolton to stop resisting.

Strong at Any Cost

A three-part Star-Ledger series on the secret world of steroid use by law enforcement officers and firefighters.

• About this series

• List of law enforcement agencies, fire departments

• Glossary of terms

Part 1: Sunday

• N.J. doctor supplied steroids to hundreds of law enforcement officers, firefighters

• Five deaths in 19 months linked to steroids, Lowen's pharmacy

• Legal cases linked to N.J. police who received steroids through Dr. Colao

• Ex-Jets quarterback Ray Lucas was prescribed steroids, HGH by Dr. Colao

Part 2: Monday

• N.J. taxpayers get bill for millions in steroid, growth hormone prescriptions for cops, firefighters

• Ex-Harrison firefighter on disability works full-time for N.C. fire department

• N.J. lawmaker calls on attorney general to investigate steroids, HGH use among law enforcement

Part 3: Tuesday

• Booming anti-aging business relies on risky mix of steroids, growth hormone

Additional coverage:

• N.J. to investigate illegal steroid use by law enforcement officers

• N.J. suspends disability benefits for ex-Harrison firefighter working in N.C. fire department

• Heads of largest N.J. police unions support random steroids testing for officers

• Magazine for N.J. law enforcement contains ads for anabolic steroid providers

• Two bills to address steroid use among N.J. law enforcement officers, firefighters

• N.J. pension board members denounce former Harrison firefighter as a cheat, fraud

• N.J. Assembly panel approves stricter rules on growth hormone use

Vargas and Stise did not respond to letters and calls for comment. A lawyer for Jersey City called Bolton’s claims "totally without merit." In a legal brief filed in June, the officers’ lawyers asked a judge to bar any mention of steroid use at trial, saying it was not relevant to the struggle with Bolton and that it could improperly inflame a jury.

“Given the broad hostility to athletes who abuse steroids — Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguez and Manny (Ramirez) are widely hated — a jury that hears steroid evidence could readily misfire,” the lawyers wrote.

­The judge denied the request. In October, the two sides agreed to forgo a trial in favor of binding arbitration.

Jack Caban v. City of Jersey City and Michael Stise

Venue:

Superior Court in Jersey City

Filed:

Dec. 29, 2009

Status:

Settled for an undisclosed sum in August

Caban, an employee of a Jersey City pest-control company, said he was standing outside his business with a female friend in July 2008 when officer Michael Stise, who received testosterone and HCG from Colao, drove by in an unmarked car with another officer.

The suit claims the officers made an inappropriate gesture to the friend. Caban, 25, claims he gave the passing car a “thumbs-up” sign in return. Stise and his partner stopped the car, threw Caban against a wall, searched his pockets and tossed his belongings to the ground, the lawsuit states.

“You don’t know who you’re (expletive) with,” Stise said, according to the suit.

The officers also accused Caban of dealing drugs and possessing a weapon, Caban charges in the suit. He was not arrested. A lawyer for Stise and the second officer did not respond to requests for comment.

Germe v. Township of Edison et al.

Venue:

U.S. District Court in Newark

Filed:

May 17, 2010

Status:

Legal case ongoing; FBI investigating officers’ actions

Lenus Germe, a 44-year-old construction worker, claims Edison patrolmen Salvatore Capriglione and Scot Sofield were among a larger group of officers who beat him as he lay handcuffed on the ground in May 2008. The incident was captured on film by a patrol car’s video camera. The officers had responded to a call that Germe assaulted his girlfriend.

At Edison police headquarters, Germe claims, the officers donned leather gloves and beat him again, then threw him down a flight of stairs to an area where prisoners are housed. There, the suit says, the officers continued to strike him until he lost consciousness. Before summoning an ambulance, the officers poured alcohol over Germe's face and body, he claims.

He was treated for a concussion, internal trauma and other injuries at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, the lawsuit states.

The officers contend Germe resisted arrest, went for one patrolman's gun and tried to run away. Germe, who has previous convictions for weapons possession and dealing drugs, pleaded guilty to resisting arrest in the current case. He has since been released from jail.

Germe's lawyer, Lennox Hinds, said FBI agents were investigating the incident and had already interviewed his client. An FBI spokesman, Bryan Travers, said he could neither confirm nor deny an investigation was under way. Edison Police Chief Thomas Bryan did not return repeated phone calls.

The suit makes no reference to steroids. Records show Colao prescribed testosterone and HCG for Sofield, 36. Capriglione, 44, received testosterone, HCG and stanozolol. Sofield did not respond to requests for comment. Capriglione’s lawyer, Charles J. Sciarra, said his client did nothing wrong.

"We are stunned that without any medical background into the health and medical condition of Sal that The Star-Ledger is printing medical information obtained from God only knows where," Sciarra said. "Sal is a decorated officer with a spotless employment record and despite the invitation to discuss his private medical issues in the pages of The Star-Ledger, we decline to do so. All appropriate paperwork was filed with Edison's insurance, a fact long known to Sal's superiors. Further, the linkage suggested and the aspersion cast that Sal acted inappropriately in the arrest of Germe, whose lawsuit seeks a taxpayer-funded payday after pleading guilty to assaultive, resistive conduct, including trying to disarm a police officer, is really scraping the barrel."

Hardy v. Jason Ullrich

Venue:

U.S. District Court in Camden

Filed:

March 16, 2009

Status:

Ongoing

State inmate Frank Hardy III contends three corrections officers were escorting him to lockup at the Garden State Youth Correctional Facility in Burlington County when one of the officers, Jason Ullrich, intentionally tripped him, causing him to fall and hit his head on a wall.

Ullrich, 36, who received prescriptions for testosterone and HCG from Colao, then jumped on Hardy's back with a second officer and began punching the inmate, the suit claims. Hardy, 25, contends the March 2009 beating left him with several knots on his head.

Ullrich did not respond to a letter seeking comment. A spokesman for the state Attorney General's Office, which represents Ullrich in the suit, declined to comment. Hardy has since been transferred to South Woods State Prison in Cumberland County.

Pantusco v. Sorrell et al.

Venue:

U.S. District Court in Newark

Filed:

July 16, 2009

Status:

Ongoing

Patrick Pantusco, who had been an inmate at East Jersey State Prison in Woodbridge, claims that during a standard pat-down in June 2009, corrections officer Robert Sorrell grabbed his penis through his pants leg and began to squeeze as a form of harassment. Pantusco, 35, claims he immediately reported the incident to a supervising corrections officer, angering Sorrell, 45.

The suit contends Sorrell threatened to sexually harass Pantusco again and ordered him to undergo a second pat-down, leading the inmate to complain anew. In retaliation, the suit claims, Sorrell trumped up an administrative charge against Pantusco, who was transferred to Northern State Prison in Newark.

Pantusco is serving a 30-year term for killing a Bergen County woman in a car crash that took place as he fled police in June 1996. Sorrell declined to comment. Records show he received stanozolol from Colao.

The Pantusco lawsuit is the second against Sorrell. In 2006, another inmate accused him of fabricating an administrative charge that caused him to be denied parole. The inmate was later exonerated. The state settled the suit for $40,000 last year, legal documents show.

Arrest of Jersey City officer Brian McGovern

Location:

Point Pleasant Beach

Charge:

Simple assault

Date arrested:

May 25, 2009

Status:

Pleaded guilty to violating local ordinance

McGovern, 40, was charged with two counts of simple assault on Memorial Day last year after getting into a fight with another man. During the fracas, McGovern also struck a 37-year-old Hoboken woman, according to press accounts of the arrest.

The incident did not result in litigation, but McGovern’s name came up in the lawsuit Mathias Bolton filed against the Jersey City Police Department and officers Victor Vargas and Michael Stise. In trying to prove a pattern of negligence regarding steroid use within the department, an expert hired by Bolton’s legal team noted in court papers McGovern had filled 20 prescriptions for steroids and human growth hormone in 2006 and 2007, yet he was not tested for steroid use after his 2009 arrest.

"In my opinion, the potential link between steroid use and the allegation of violent conduct is obvious, especially given this officer's prior use of steroids," wrote the expert, Wayne Fisher, executive director of the Police Institute at Rutgers University.

Records of Colao's prescriptions reviewed by The Star-Ledger show McGovern was prescribed stanozolol, testosterone and HCG.

The criminal charges against him were dismissed on Nov. 10 last year. On the same day, he pleaded guilty to violating a Point Pleasant Beach ordinance that bars fighting and misbehaving, records show. He paid a $500 fine. The Jersey City Police Department suspended him without pay for seven days. McGovern did not respond to calls seeking comment.

Firing of Detective Sgt. Ellis Haroldson

Location:

Cliffside Park

Date fired:

May 27, 2010

Cause:

Abuse of office and other administrative charges

Haroldson, 45, a 16-year veteran of the Cliffside Park force, had been on unpaid suspension since November 2009 for allegedly harassing a couple he contends owed him $15,000.

The money was intended as a fee to a local businessman, who was expected, in turn, to help raise $500,000 bail for Michael Mastromarino, a former Fort Lee dentist charged with trafficking in stolen body parts.

When the businessman failed to raise the bail money, Haroldson waged a campaign of harassment against the man and his wife, repeatedly calling them and using his badge to give muscle to his threats, investigators alleged.

Haroldson, who filled at least three prescriptions for testosterone from Colao, was not charged criminally, but he faced departmental charges that included abuse of public office, conduct unbecoming a police officer and official misconduct. The borough council ultimately made the decision to fire him.

Mastromarino eventually pleaded guilty to dozens of counts connected to the body-parts ring, in which he paid funeral directors in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania for access to cadavers. The stolen parts were then sold on the medical transplant market.

Vincent O’Hara, the businessman Haroldson allegedly harassed, committed suicide in March.

Haroldson and his lawyer, Robert Galantucci, did not respond to requests for comment.

Suspension of sheriff’s officer Rafael Galan

Location:

Passaic County

Date suspended:

April 2009

Cause:

Allegations of official misconduct

Status:

Reinstated July 2010

Galan, a detective who once served in the department’s narcotics bureau, spent more than a year on unpaid suspension as he fought administrative and criminal charges alleging he alerted a drug dealer to an investigation, lied to a judge under oath, falsified police reports, failed to arrest suspects and consorted with criminals.

Suspended in early April of last year, he was criminally charged with official misconduct three weeks later. The Passaic County Prosecutor’s Office dropped the case with little explanation in April of this year, clearing the way for Galan’s return. He was reinstated in July.

Galan, 39, has faced other allegations during his 17 years on the Passaic County force. A whistle-blower lawsuit filed against the department by a fellow officer last year claims Galan tipped off a steroid dealer to an investigation focused on a Totowa gym in 2005.

In 2004, he was one of 10 officers ordered to undergo drug tests that included a screen for steroids. The results were not publicly disclosed.

Galan did not respond to requests for comment sent though his lawyer and the sheriff’s department. Records show he received testosterone and HCG from Colao.

Gun discharge of Passaic County sheriff’s officer Martin Elphick

Location:

Paterson

Date of incident:

April 28, 2008

Status:

Retired on accidental disability

Elphick, now 37, was placed on modified duty after firing his service weapon at a moving vehicle on a Paterson street. The shooting occurred after Elphick pulled over a motorist he suspected of involvement in a drug deal, according to an account in The Record.

The traffic stop prompted a second motorist, the driver of a pickup truck, to speed off, striking a 56-year-old woman. Elphick fired at the fleeing pickup three times, the news report said. The shots caused no injuries.

The state Attorney General’s Office later ruled Elphick violated use-of-force guidelines and should not have fired his gun. He did not return to active duty. A little more than two months after the shooting, Elphick received an accidental disability retirement. Records show he filled prescriptions for testosterone between August and October 2006.

Elphick’s lawyer, Harley Breite, would not comment on any relationship between his client and Colao. Breite said Elphick’s retirement had nothing to do with the shooting, stemming instead from a traumatic incident in which he tried unsuccessfully to save a child who had drowned in a Paterson reservoir. A news account of the 2006 incident describes sheriff’s officers trying to revive the 10-year-old boy with CPR and a defibrillator.