@muszynskiBP

BRISTOL - A former city woman charged with making false rape and harassment accusations against a Bristol police officer has been ordered to undergo a competency evaluation to determine if she can understand the proceedings against her.

Janell Commeau, 25, currently of Massachusetts, was given the order during a hearing Friday, in Bristol Superior Court, after her attorney, Kevin Creed, requested the evaluation.

The request came the same day state prosecutor Elizabeth Moseley said she has extended a plea bargain offer to Commeau. The deal would include a one-year maximum sentence in prison, with the stipulation that Creed could argue for a lesser period of imprisonment during sentencing.

Commeau, who is free on $7,500 bond, must be evaluated before she could make a decision on the plea dea. The evaluation will determine if she's competent to understand the proceedings against her and if she could help in her own defense. She is due back in court on Nov. 27.

Commeau has pleaded not guilty to charges of tampering with a witness, second-degree harassment, conspiracy to commit second-degree harassment, making a false statement, conspiracy to make a false statement, second-degree stalking and conspiracy to commit second-degree stalking.

According to the warrant for her arrest, Commeau made a citizen's complaint against an officer and tried to get a restraining order against him - which would have barred him from carrying a gun, preventing him from working - after police believe she was “romantically spurned” and became “obsessed” with the victim.

As part of her "campaign of false complaints and allegations in an attempt to destroy” the officer’s relationship and career, police wrote in the warrant, Commeau said the officer regularly entered her home unwelcomed to drug and rape her, hacked her cell phone so he could listen to her and stalked her, following her and driving by her home, sometimes as many as 10 times a day. During an extensive internal affairs investigation, police said they were able to prove her allegations were false.

Police wrote in the warrant that investigators also suspect Commeau had someone possibly hack the officer's deactivated Facebook account to get information about him. They also believe she may have been behind an account that harassed the officer's girlfriend.

Between March and August last year, Commeau did a number of things to harass the officer, including her filing of a citizen's complaint, launching an internal affairs investigation, after she made claims that a police officer was allowed into her Bristol home by her roommate multiple times to drug and rape Commeau. The roommate served as a witness, but police discovered Commeau had coached her about what to say, according to the warrant.

Commeau also reported that the officer followed her around the city and drove by her home numerous times a day in his police cruiser. Police were able to use the GPS in the vehicle to prove he was nowhere near her home when she said he was or that he wasn't working on some of the days she alleged, giving him no access to a cruiser. Police also examined her phone and found no evidence of any malware as she had alleged.

Commeau also made a number of other claims against the officer that police were able to prove were false, according to the warrant. Her attorney withdrew the request for a restraining order after being presented with the internal affairs investigation, which cleared the officer of any wrongdoing.

During the investigation, police found that she has been diagnosed as bi-polar and sustained a serious brain injury about six years ago during a car accident, the warrant said.

Justin Muszynski can be reached at 860-973-1809 or jmuszynski@bristolpress.com.