MADISON, Wis. - A college student who faked her abduction and set off a desperate search was sentenced to three years' probation Thursday and ordered to repay the police department at least $9,000.
Audrey Seiler, 20, pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges of obstructing officers and read a statement in court in which she said severe depression had caused her to act irrationally.
"I'm taking care of myself now, so someday people will see I'm still a girl to be proud of," Seiler said. The Rockford, Minn., woman withdrew from the University of Wisconsin-Madison after the incident and is in therapy.
After her March 27 disappearance, dozens of volunteers slogged through marshes and woods as national TV broadcast surveillance footage of her leaving her off-campus apartment late at night with no coat or purse.
She turned up four days later, curled in a fetal position in a marsh, and claiming she had been abducted at knifepoint.
Her story soon crumbled, and investigators said she faked the abduction because she was upset over her fading relationship with her boyfriend.
Police concluded Seiler made up her abduction after obtaining a store videotape that showed her buying the knife, duct tape, rope and cold medicine she claimed her abductor used to restrain her.
She could have gotten nine months in jail and a $10,000 fine.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp.../missing_woman
I am suprized she didn't get more of a punishment. Depressed people don't go out and fake their kidnappings. Guess the judge bought it of just felt sorry for her.