The path to a tax-free disability pension for Nassau Police Officer Robert Grzymala. He is shown here at a driving range.

Eight months had passed since Nassau Police Officer Robert Grzymala filed his accident claim, and he was home on sick leave, recuperating from what he said was a painful back injury.

The pain was excruciating, Grzymala told the police department - so bad he couldn't make it to court to testify in a criminal case in which he'd made the arrest. The department offered to send an ambulance for him, but Grzymala refused.

Two days later, a police surveillance team - staked out on the parking lot of Pine Hills Country Club in Manorville - got a different perspective of Grzymala's condition.

There they videotaped Grzymala leaving the clubhouse carrying his golf clubs and wearing his spiked golf shoes, walking to his car. On the police videotape, he can be seen bending at the waist more than 90 degrees, reaching down straight-legged, taking his shoes off, and putting them and the golf clubs in the trunk, according to police.

"There was absolutely nothing wrong with this guy," said Dep. Insp. John Sharp, who was then head of the Nassau County Police Department's medical unit. Observing department guidelines, Sharp would identify Grzymala only as "the golfer."

The next day, Sharp said, "the golfer" reported to headquarters and, under questioning, admitted that he'd played 23 holes of golf that day, repeating the toughest holes, and stopping only when darkness was near.

The incident occurred in April, 1987. Today, Grzymala, 46, collects an annual disability pension of $44,857, tax-free, awarded by the state despite the testimony of Nassau police officers who monitored him. The story of Grzymala's injury, the police surveillance detail, the department's effort to block his pension, and Grzymala's victory is often told within the police department, officials said, as evidence of a flawed disability pension system in which medical testimony can overrule eyewitness evidence that an applicant is capable of more physical exertion than he admits.

Grzymala was aided in his quest for a disability pension by Carle Place attorney Richard Lerner, one of Long Island's expert police disability attorneys, and by Dr. Jacob Lehman of Patchogue, an orthopedist who frequently treats injured police.

Grzymala's pension gives him time to pursue the game he loves. Last year he had an official PGA handicap of 8.3, according to records viewed by Newsday. He shoots in the high 70s and low 80s, according to scores posted on the bulletin board at the Holbrook Country Club.

But Grzymala, in an interview, denied he even has a golf handicap and said he plays golf only occasionally. "I don't really have a handicap . . . I am handicapped," Grzymala said.

Dr. William Mallon, a former pro golfer and now an orthopedic surgeon in Durham, N.C., said in an interview: "It's hard to imagine how he can play golf to an eight handicap and have a hundred percent disability on his back." Mallon, until recently a professor at Duke University, added, "If you look at the things that stress a back, golf is usually listed as the hobby that does it the most. I think he'd have trouble playing."

Another expert in back problems, Dr. Vert Mooney, an orthopedics professor at the University of California at San Diego, said, however, that "many people with back problems can play golf ... If it seems to aggravate pain, it's not a good thing to do."

Newsday watched Grzymala over two days last fall performing the duties of a course starter and ranger at the Holbrook Country Club, where he parks his 1992 Ford Explorer in a handicapped space.

Grzymala, however, denied he works at the course. "I have friends at the golf course who are working there as pros. I just go down there and chat with them and hit a few balls."

Grzymala's disability case began in August, 1986, when he said he injured his back after responding to an accident scene. Two cars had collided in Levittown and locked together.

Grzymala asked Donald Marx, one of the drivers, to move his car. Marx complied, and the other car, with no one in it, began rolling. Grzymala rushed to stop the rolling car and said he was thrown to the ground.

Marx disputed Grzymala's account, telling Newsday Grzymala merely opened the car door, got in and put his foot on the brake.

Grzymala's lawyer, Lerner, said that Grzymala had medical documentation of a back injury. His personal orthopedist, Dr. Lehman, concluded that Grzymala was disabled and would never again be able to work as a police officer.

Medical files obtained by Newsday show differing opinions. Medical tests indicated Grzymala had either a bulging disc or a small herniation in his back. An MRI in October, 1986, indicated a "diffusely herniated disc."

A year later, a lumbar myelogram found no herniation, and another physician treating him, Dr. Russell Windsor, concluded that the herniation was minor and didn't appear "to agree with the amount of pain that he is having."

"He persists in complaining of lower lumbosacral spine discomfort," Windsor wrote in finding Grzymala disabled. "The recommendation was made to consider a complete disability from the police force and pursue this further since if he cannot handle a sedentary sitting job because of persistent back pain, then he certainly is not able to return to the active field of his job."

Grzymala missed months of work after the accident. In the spring of 1987, Sharp contacted Grzymala while he was home on sick leave, asking him to testify against a man Grzymala had arrested in 1985 in connection with a family disturbance. The case had suffered repeated delays, partly because of Grzymala's injury.

With the county unable to produce Grzymala, the prosecution plea-bargained and the man agreed to plead guilty to disorderly conduct and was fined $75.

The police department offered its videotape of Grzymala to the state retirement system, but the state medical board found him disabled, and in 1990, after a series of delays, the pension was awarded. Deputy State Comptroller John McManaman defended the decision. "The county's doctors, our doctor and his doctors said this guy could not perform full duties," said McManaman. "There was full agreement."