Men charged with animal cruelty during 'Manhunt' shoot found not guilty by Monroeville judge

Three men charged with animal cruelty after an alleged incident while filming in Monroeville for the television series “Manhunt: Deadly Games” were found not guilty.

According to court records, the three were initially charged with two misdemeanors each of animal cruelty. Those charges were withdrawn and moved over to a non-traffic docket as summary offenses, meaning the cases would be kept at the district level instead of a higher court.

On Feb. 24 and 25, Magistrate Jeffrey Herbst in Monroeville found each man to be not guilty of each allegation.

Antonio Spencer, 33, of Bridgeville said the allegations “destroyed our lives for a solid six months.”

Spencer had hired fellow animal trainers Ed Wiernik, 60, of Oakdale and Phillip Hoelcher, 73, of Umatilla, Fla., to help with dogs that day of filming, which took place near Rosecrest Drive in Monroeville.

Filming for the American true-crime miniseries’ second season took place from June to November 2019 at locations in Penn Hills, Monroeville and Pittsburgh.

The criminal complaint filed against them by an Animal Friends police officer said the men were seen putting cayenne pepper on dogs’ noses during a July 23 incident.

“It was not real cayenne pepper,” Spencer said. “There was makeup and food coloring on the actors’ hands. Nothing went into the dogs’ noses or eyes. Nothing was ingested, except for food and they were given toys for praise.”

Spencer said the scene being shot involved police dogs tracking a suspect through the woods.

“To escape the police, (the suspect) would put cayenne pepper down to throw off the dogs when he went into the woods,” Spencer said.

Spencer, who said he has 15 years of experience training police and military dogs, said he trained the dogs for months for that scene – to look like they had stopped tracking and act strange, all by using verbal commands.

The words “cayenne pepper” were likely used on the set, Spencer said.

“But in the movie industry, when you’re filming a scene, you’re not gonna say ‘give me the fake gun’ or ‘give me the fake grenades.’ On the props list, there was a bullet-proof vest, SWAT kits, cayenne pepper … but everything on the props list is just that – a prop,” Spencer said.

Wiernik, an ex-marine with more than 40 years of experience training dogs, said he would never harm his dogs.

“I took an oath not just for the four years as a marine, but in life. I wouldn’t put my family, innocent people or animals in harm’s way,” he said.

Wiernik and Hoelcher said they lost business and money while the case pended.

“The whole thing was just weird,” said Hoelcher. “It all could have been resolved in 10 seconds if someone would have come up and asked. No one did that. I was never contacted by anyone.”

Hoelcher, 74, lives in Florida. He traveled to Monroeville twice before the judge found him and the others not guilty of the charges. He said he sank $14,000 in the case.

Animal Friends, the arresting agency involved in the case, did not respond to a request for comment.

Originally entitled “Manhunt: Lone Wolf,” the 10-part series available on Spectrum Originals debuted Feb. 3.

The season focuses on exonerated security guard Richard Jewell, who was first praised for his quick action and then accused of a bombing at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.