A Montco woman who was sentenced to 21 years for her friend’s overdose death has her prison term cut by half

A Montgomery County woman whose case became a cause célèbre among addiction recovery advocates after she was sentenced to more 21 years for her role in a friend’s heroin overdose death saw her punishment cut by more than half Friday under a new deal struck with prosecutors.

The agreement brought about an end to the nearly decade-long legal saga of Emma Semler, 28, of Collegeville, who has already spent about four years in prison for the 2014 death of 20-year-old Jenny Werstler. Her original conviction was overturned by an appeals court in 2021.

But as the federal judge overseeing her case accepted the new deal — under which Semler will serve an additional five years behind bars — she did little to hide her displeasure.

U.S. District Judge Gene E.K. Pratter accused prosecutors and Semler’s defense attorney of attempting to make an end run around earlier sentences she’d imposed and tying her hands with their new plea agreement, under which Semler pleaded guilty to lesser charges of drug possession and using Facebook to facilitate a drug deal.

“It implies a lack of respect not only for the judge,” Pratter said, “but even more fundamentally for … the suffering of the victims and the safety of the public.”

Still, Pratter’s decision to accept the new agreement delivered the latest twist in a case that has demonstrated how the region’s opioid crisis has toppled thousands of lives, ripped families apart, and exposed how the lines between life and death, victim and perpetrator, are often hazy.

Werstler and Semler first met in an addiction treatment facility in Delaware County; both had been addicted to heroin since they were teenagers. By May 2014, Semler had relapsed, and on the night of her 20th birthday, Werstler reached out to Semler looking to buy heroin.

She and Semler injected together in the bathroom of a West Philadelphia Kentucky Fried Chicken. Werstler fatally overdosed. Semler and her younger sister, then 17, panicked and fled the scene without a word.

Semler subsequently recovered from her addiction, began working for a treatment center, and has expressed remorse for Werstler’s death. But federal prosecutors opted in 2017 to charge her under a law originally designed to punish dealers that has increasingly been used in recent years to prosecute drug users who have shared drugs with others who then overdosed and died.

At her 2018 trial, prosecutors contended it was Semler who had fronted Werstler the money to buy the heroin they used together.

Semler knew the drug dealer and carried out the transaction over Facebook.

A jury found Semler guilty and Pratter sentenced her to 21 years — one year more than the mandatory minimum sentence under the federal drug distribution involving death statute.

But in 2021, a federal appellate court overturned her conviction, saying the law shouldn’t apply in situations where the defendant and the victim had bought drugs to use together.

As Semler faced the prospect of a new trial, she and the government came to a deal last year. Prosecutors agreed to recommend a sentence of between seven to 10 years if she pleaded guilty. But Pratter refused to accept it, saying she intended to sentence Semler to 15 years.

Semler backed out and her case remained in limbo until the new agreement that led to her sentencing on Friday.

Under the new terms, prosecutors agreed to drop the drug distribution involving death charge — and its stiff two-decade mandatory minimum — and Semler agreed to plead guilty to lesser felony charges that carried a combined maximum sentence of nine years.

With those terms, the lawyers ensured that Pratter could not impose a sentence that went beyond their recommendation.

“Given the entirety of this case, the fact that it has been going on for close to a decade, the fact that we want to give some sense of finality and justice to this family,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Everett R. Witherell, “nothing that happens here today is going to change that.”

Still, Pratter’s displeasure was evident throughout the three-hour proceeding.

She ordered U.S. Attorney Jacqueline C. Romero, the region’s top federal prosecutor, to attend the hearing to defend her office’s deal with Semler but then never addressed her directly in court.

Noting that this time, prosecutors had opted not to take the charges before a grand jury, Pratter said: “Here, the U.S. Attorney has taken away the decision from the public and has decided herself what charges should be brought against you.” (Romero’s office did not return a call for comment after the hearing.)

For her part, Semler declined to address Pratter on Friday, as she had done at previous hearings. The judge, however, peppered her with questions.

“Do you know how long Ms. Werstler will be in her grave by [the time you are released from prison]?” Pratter asked.

Semler started to respond but was quickly cut off.

“When you are released from prison, she will have been dead 13½ years,” the judge said. “You should try figuring that out.”

In addition to the prison term, Pratter ordered Semler to pay a $20,000 fine and serve one year’s probation upon her release, during which time she will be banned from using social media.

Werstler’s mother, Margaret, who watched from the courtroom gallery, said the sentence wasn’t the justice she’d originally hoped for her only child, but that after a decade of legal wrangling, it was an outcome she was willing to accept.

“It’s just beyond what a normal person can stand — what’s going on in this case,” she said, adding: “I can move on with this [and] some day when she gets out — I’m wishing her the best.”

She spoke, too, of the other ways in which she felt the system had failed her daughter: Jenny Werstler had only been in the area on the night she died because she’d been forced to return from a Florida rehab in order to attend a court hearing in a drug case in Chester County. Had she been allowed to stay in treatment, her mother suggested, she might be alive.

Members of Semler’s family said they felt for the Werstlers, and believed there were no good outcomes in the case.

“The real message is the tragedy of addiction, and how a few poor choices can end up in such a significant life event,” said Tracy Conway, the partner of Semler’s late mother.