Standing by her lawyer’s side, her family close by, Melissa M. Ruch didn’t speak after pleading guilty Wednesday in Schuylkill County court to misdemeanor charge of making a false report.

The charge — three other misdemeanor charges were dropped — stemmed from an incident in which Ruch, 42, said she had been attacked by a man and thrown down a steep embankment along Route 309 in West Penn Township on Sept. 2, 2015, while on the job as a police officer.State police at Frackville say the attack never happened.Later Wednesday, Ruch told her side of the story.She entered the plea not because she was admitting to making up the attack. Instead, she said, it was to spare her family the stress of a potential jail sentence or the worry of financial burden on the chance a jury might find her guilty.Her lawyer, Frederick J. Fanelli, “was 90 percent sure we would have won the case.”“There were 12 people on that jury that didn’t know me and I didn’t know them, and putting my fate, future and possible freedom (in jeopardy) is not something I was going to chance,” Ruch said.“Everybody wanted me to fight it, but I love my family too much to take that risk,” Ruch said.“If I was guilty and they had a case, do you really think they would have offered me this plea?“I wasn’t pleading guilty to the incident. I did not plead guilty of doing this. I was not guilty as a whole,” she said.Three other false report-related charges, all misdemeanors, were dropped.“I’m not saying the incident did not happen,” she said.But Ruch says she still cannot remember what happened that day.“I wish I could tell you. I remember dealing with a guy with a tear drop (tattoo).“Something happened that day. Something happened. But what?” she said.State police interviewed her while she was in the hospital with severe head injuries.Ruch saw several doctors, including neurologists, who confirmed her head injuries.“I was just released three months ago to go back to work,” she said.Ruch said state police did not take pictures of her injuries, although she was covered with bruises and cuts.“It was a witch hunt,” she said.“A lot of things were left out” of police and news reports, she said.“I feel I was already judged by the court of public opinion and the media with the public only hearing one side of the story,” she said.She said she has copies of her call to 911 dispatchers on that day, tapes on which the sounds of car doors slamming and a man’s voice can be heard.A dash cam on a state police cruiser shows Ruch’s Taser, which she said she used on the man, being passed from hand to hand by state police, and several people touched her cruiser at the scene, sullying potential evidence.“I have nothing to hide,” she said.