Ex-NYPD cop acquitted of rape gets 1 year

One of the former NYPD cops acquitted in May of raping a drunken fashion executive got a year in jail for official misconduct Monday and an earful from a judge who scolded him as a liar and a disgrace to the badge.

"At the time you were supposed to be prepared to respond to an emergency, you were in bed with an intoxicated, naked young woman," Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Gregory Carro told fired officer Kenneth Moreno as his accuser cried in the front row. "That's official misconduct."

Moreno, 43, and former partner Franklin Mata, 29, were accused of taking sexual advantage of a semiconscious 29-year-old Gap fashion designer during three post-midnight visits to her East Village apartment after helping her upstairs from a cab in December 2008.

They said they were giving her alcohol counseling. Moreno testified that she stripped and dragged him into her bed, but he denied having any sex. Mata waited outside as a lookout, prosecutors said.

Without forensic evidence proving intercourse, jurors in May convicted the two men only of three counts of official misconduct for visiting her apartment when they were supposed to be on duty.

Mata and Moreno were immediately fired, but the convictions -- all misdemeanors -- were not expected to carry jail time as the men are first offenders.

Carro told Moreno that he "clearly" didn't tell the truth -- calling him a "fox" who had "tailored" his testimony by "admitting what he couldn't deny, and denying what he couldn't admit."

The judge said he accepted the jury's verdict that there was no rape but believed Moreno had abused trust in the police. "You've ripped a hole in the fabric of our society," the judge said. "There has to be some import to that."

The accuser, who now lives in San Francisco, did not speak at the hearing.

Prosecutors sought the maximum under sentencing limitations -- two years in prison on the three misdemeanor counts. The judge imposed one year on each count, to be served concurrently.

He ordered Moreno to jail immediately, but an appeals judge later released him on $125,000 bail pending the appeal.

Defense lawyer Joseph Tacopina urged the judge to respect the jury's verdict by imposing no jail time. After the sentencing, Tacopina said he thought Carro was affected by the case's notoriety.

"I wish everyone was as courageous as the jury was," he said.

Mata's sentencing was postponed until Wednesday because his lawyer was involved in another trial Monday.