Woman who lied about assault sent to jail REDWOOD CITY

A San Mateo woman who lied about being sexually assaulted at gunpoint by a group of men after her car supposedly broke down in Foster City was sentenced Tuesday to 90 days in jail for filing a false police report.

Karyn Galila, 24, sobbed in a Redwood City courtroom as Commissioner Kathleen McKenna ordered her taken into custody immediately. Galila was handcuffed as her husband looked on. He tried to hug her before she was led away but was ordered by a bailiff not to touch her.

Galila apparently made up the assault story to explain to her husband why she had come home late after rendezvousing at a restaurant with a man she had recently met online, according to her probation report.

"This was such a detailed, fabricated story," said McKenna, the San Mateo County Superior Court magistrate who handled sentencing. "This kind of conduct does warrant a jail sentence."

Galila was arrested after initially telling police she had been sexually assaulted the night of June 12 after her Jeep broke down on Foster City Boulevard. She admitted she had lied when she said a group of as many as five men had pushed the SUV onto a nearby street, then assaulted her at gunpoint.

A fingerprint from Galila's SUV led investigators to a 25-year-old San Mateo man, who was able to produce a receipt from the restaurant and a witness who placed both him and Galila there when the assault was supposedly taking place, authorities said.

Galila pleaded no contest Dec. 31 to one misdemeanor count of filing a false police report.

"She at this point is still struggling to figure out why she conducted herself the way she did," Galila's attorney, Earl Jiang, said at sentencing. "She is genuinely sorry for her conduct."

Jiang pleaded for leniency, saying Galila has a young child to care for. But prosecutor Rebecca Baum argued for jail time, saying Galila's actions could have led to the man being wrongly incarcerated.

Galila, a dental assistant, now faces jail time and a court order to pay police about $5,000 to cover the cost of their investigation.

Prosecutions for filing a false police report are relatively rare in San Mateo County and often don't result in much jail time, Chief Deputy District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe said. Defendants often serve their time in the sheriff's work program, but McKenna ordered Galila jailed immediately.

"I think it was because the conduct was outrageous," Wagstaffe said. "We have a criminal justice system that is based from A to Z on being able to rely on the truth of our victims."