District attorney holds post-trial press conference to review Rodriguez trial

In an unusual move, Lebanon County District Attorney Pier Hess Graf spent about 33 minutes Tuesday afternoon, May 27, repeating the evidence her office presented to a jury last week to obtain a conviction of Veronika Rodriguez.

The 27-year-old Middletown woman was convicted of making a false rape report and illegally recording her encounter with the man she claimed assaulted her, a fellow Pennsylvania Air National Guard member.

Standing at the podium in the large meeting room of the Lebanon County Department of Emergency Services building, Graf methodically went through the same testimony and shared many of the same exhibits her assistant, Amy Muller, presented in the five-day trial last week. Graf did not participate directly in the Rodriguez trial.

Graf said she would be asking for “a modicum” of jail time when Rodriguez is sentenced on Aug. 20 by Judge Charles Jones. The two illegal recording charges against Rodriguez are felonies, each carrying a potential seven-year jail sentence. The making false reports charge is a misdemeanor that carries a maximum two-year sentence.

Pennsylvania law allows a sentencing judge to set a minimum up to one half of the maximum sentence, but in Rodriguez’s case leaves the door open to a probationary sentence.

Graf said that in making a false rape report to police, Rodriguez had ruined the victim’s career and potentially undermined the credibility of every woman who actually is sexually assaulted. She also criticized supporters of Rodriguez who raised over $20,000 for her defense in a GoFundMe campaign.

Some of those supporters conducted a highly personal and at times vicious social media campaign against Graf, attacking her record on prosecuting sex crimes as well as her personal past. Graf said those same supporters had harassed, and continue to harass, the victim, who is a physician in New York.

Graf said that her post-trial press conference was not due to any personal animosity toward Rodriguez or her supporters, or a response to their social media smear campaign against her.

“I could have responded to that over the last however many months, but I chose not to,” she said. “My job is to do my job and to get justice for a victim, which is what we did in this case.”

Graf closed by saying that she called Tuesday’s press conference because “I wanted to make sure that the true, accurate evidence is what got out.”

Asked if she thought that media reports about the Rodriguez trial were inaccurate, she responded “in some areas, yes.” Asked how, she refused to specify before ending the press conference.

Editor’s note: An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that Senior Deputy District Attorney Amy Muller, who tried the case for the commonwealth, was not present at Tuesday’s press conference. Although Muller did not come on stage or participate in the event, she was in attendance at the back of the room. We sincerely regret the error.