Sprinkle pleads to misdemeanors

Gloria Lee Sprinkle has served her last day in jail, providing she meets the terms of her probation agreement reached Monday in Judge James B. Wheelis’ 19th Judicial District courtroom.

Sprinkle is the 53-year-old woman who held police at bay for 19 hours on March 26 and 27 outside the 520 Robbe Road home north of Libby that she shared with her husband. 

On March 26, Sprinkle pulled a pearl-handled kitchen knife on her attorney husband, Charles Sprinkle. Charles Sprinkle managed to get the knife away from her before she returned from another room with a loaded Winchester model 70 .257 rifle chambered for a Roberts bullet and then fired a round in her husband’s presence.

Charles Sprinkle fled the home to summon police and what followed was a 19-hour standoff that included a SWAT team before she surrendered to police.

That was then. On Monday, Charles Sprinkle sat with his wife in court, chatting as she waited for her case to be called before Wheelis. Charles Sprinkle left before his wife’s case was called, however.

   Originally charged with three felony counts, Sprinkle on Monday changed her plea to two guilty misdemeanor counts of negligent endangerment, far less than the three felony counts originally sought by Lincoln County Attorney Bernard Cassidy.

   A message left at Charles Sprinkle’s office for comment on the outcome of the case in which he was a victim were not returned.

   After questioning Sprinkle as to whether she was continuing her medication and reporting to counseling to which she admitted she is and acknowledging she understood his comments, Wheelis sentenced Sprinkle to a year of probation on each misdemeanor count. Sprinkle also receives credit for the 155 days she served in the Lincoln County Jail before being released on her own recognizance, effectively reducing her probation to 575 days or a little more than 19 months.

   Sprinkle was released on her own recognizance two months ago.  

Cassidy, who prosecuted the case, said Monday he hopes Sprinkle can uphold the terms of her probation.

“She mentally ill,” Cassidy said. “She must maintain her medications, continue treatment with the mental-health facility, not drink alcohol or be in places where it is sold,” Cassidy said, explaining the terms of probation.

Initially, Sprinkle pleaded not-guilty in April as a result of the standoff that had law-enforcement positioned outside her home in an armored vehicle. 

Sprinkle’s attorney, court-appointed public defender Noel K. Larrivee, sat with a smartly dressed Sprinkle in a blazer.

At the end of the proceedings, Sprinkle walked out of the courtroom without looking back.