I think to make this much easier the moderator could be allowed to access the admin GUI and when clicking a button, then it would see he is moderator status and do the predefined commands moderators could do. Maybe if a moderator bans for 0 minutes, then it counts as a kick with a reason and if for any other period then it counts as the 10-minute ban. If you want to get messy with it then make kick be mute.