Got my phone back from police after it was in lost-mode and now I cannot unlock it. It asks for my 4 digit passcode, which I type in, but it keeps telling me my phone is disabled...ideas?

Crazy success story...my car got broken into while I was at a kickball game and my wallet and phone and ipod nano were stolen from my center console. After filing a police report I went home and used the "find my iphone" feature. I watched my iphone tracking dot traveling all over town, stopping at various apartment complexes. They came over to my side of town so my girlfriend and I went out to try and see if we could get a license plate number. They weren't moving for a little bit and we arrived at the place they had stopped, a small townhome/apartment complex. When we pulled into the parking lot, a truck was lingering in the middle of the lot. A guy ran from in between two cars and jumped in the truck (as if we had caught him breaking into a car). I proceeded to call 911 and pull out of the lot, with them pulling out behind me. I pulled off into a bowling ally parking lot and let them pass me. I began to follow them while talking to the 911 dispatcher and after 5 minutes, they were pulled over by 5 or 6 police cars. They found lots of stolen goods in the car and I was able to provide the detectives with screenshots of where else they had been so hopefully they will be able to get other people back their stuff. While they didnt find my wallet or ipod, they did find my phone and gave it back to me....

Problem is, I turned it off "lost mode" and it still won't accept my 4 digit pass code. Every time I type it in it says "Iphone has been disabled, try again in 5 minutes" so I wait 5 minutes and it says "try again in 15 minutes" and then 60, and then it says connect to itunes, and then the same cycle again.
I am not sure I have all my contacts synced...does anyone know how I can unlock it without the factory reset?

Thanks!