Woman scorned is a woman incarcerated
A woman who falsely accused a Lower Merion Township police officer of stalking and assaulting her was sentenced Friday to six to 23 months in prison for perjury.
No, a Lower Merion Township police officer didn't stalk and assault a Lansdowne women, as she had charged.
So on Friday, Gabrielle Drexler, 28, was sentenced to six to 23 months in prison and five years of consecutive probation on a felony charge of perjury.
Drexler made her accusation in a most public way — at a Lower Merion Township commissioners meeting on May 18, 2011. At the meeting, she accused one officer of stalking and assaulting her and a second of illegally detaining her.
A six-month Grand Jury investigation concluded that Drexler's accusations were baseless, that she lied to police and doctored an e-mail she had received from one of the officers, whom she had been seeing romantically. She concocted her charges, authorities said, after learning that the officer was married.
"It appears to be a case of a woman scorned," Montgomery County Assistant District Attorney John Gradel said.
Drexler was arrested in November 2011 and pleaded guilty to perjury this year after numerous delays in the proceedings.
In addition to her prison sentence, Judge William R. Carpenter fined Drexler $500 and court costs, and ordered her to perform 100 hours of community service that is yet to be determined, Gradel said.
"She got caught in a lie and she pled guilty to being caught in that lie," he said. "It was gratifying that the judge came down hard on her."