Judge overturns lower-court decision, acquits owner after canines surrendered in Bentleyville
Fredrick Frameli enters District Judge Curtis Thompson’s court in Bentleyville for a preliminary hearing last September.
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
One of the caninewas removed last August from Fredrick Frameli’s home in Bentleyville
Last August, 11 female canines, including three labeled as wolf hybrids, were seized from Fredrick Frameli’s home in Bentleyville.
This week, after the second day of a hearing that initially convened in April, a senior judge assigned to Washington County threw out a dozen summary counts of animal cruelty that were filed in connection with the Spring Street raid.
Senior Judge William R. Nalitz, in a three-line verdict filed Wednesday, wrote, “after review and consideration of the testimony, exhibits and arguments of counsel, the court finds the defendant, Fredrick Frameli, not guilty on all counts.”
Last fall, District Judge Curtis Thompson found Frameli guilty of animal cruelty and fined him $100 for each of 11 counts of failing to provide adequate food and water.
Thompson also fined Frameli $500 for a count of holding a dog underwater, which enforcement officers called “waterboarding.”
A neighbor reported the alleged activity to authorities, and snippets of video were played in Washington County Court, where Frameli had appealed Thompson’s decision.
Also last fall, Thompson dismissed 11 counts of animal cruelty alleging failure to provide sanitary conditions for the animals, calling them redundant because it was covered in the same subsection of the law as the failure to provide food and water for the animals.
Frameli said Wednesday he was “overwhelmed” when he learned of Nalitz’s decision.
“My kids, meaning my dogs, my kids mean everything to me,” he continued. “My kids are my life. When (Game Commission Officer Richard) Joyce came to my home … he destroyed my life.”
Although Nalitz did not enumerate points on which he based his verdict, Frameli’s Butler County attorney Al Lindsay employed a three-pronged attack against the cruelty charges.
“This guy loved his dogs,” Lindsay said Wednesday when learning of the verdict. “I had never met a person who passionately loved his pets more than this man.
“They had certain ailments when he got the dogs, and he was trying to work through it with them. He did the best he could. There was no cruelty or any intentional mistreatment of these dogs,” a requirement of the state law governing animal cruelty.
One of the conditions discussed in court is known as megaesophagus, which is common in breeds such as German shepherds.
Part of the prosecution’s case were records from Washington Area Humane Society showing Frameli’s dogs, which had arrived underweight, gained weight while under the society’s care.
Frameli said while the dogs were underweight, he disputed the prosecution’s claim that they were emaciated. A veterinary technician testified on his behalf that Frameli was feeding the dogs special food. Lindsay used the term “certain deficits” when describing their lack of girth.
Lindsay also claimed, in presenting his case before Nalitz, that Joyce had an “ulterior motive” to raid Frameli’s home, where he had previously seen a valuable German shepherd puppy.
Joyce testified last spring that he and his family had adopted the pup Frameli voluntarily surrendered last August. The officer charged Frameli with keeping three suspected wolf hybrids without a permit, but he later withdrew the charges.
“I did not acquire wolfdogs,” Frameli said, referring to the animals as “German shepherd mixes.”
Joyce has since retired, and an attempt Wednesday to reach him by phone did not result in an immediate response.
Lindsay called one of the key factors in his case the unavailability of Joyce’s body camera footage from the day of the raid. The Game Commission declined to turn the footage over to the defense and had it destroyed. Lindsay claimed the video footage would have proved helpful to Frameli’s case.
Assistant District Attorney John Paul Lewis was not immediately available for comment Wednesday.
Lindsay said he and Frameli will decide whether to proceed with a civil suit to reclaim the animals.
The three animals labeled as wolfdogs, which Frameli purchased in Ohio, have been living for nearly a year in a sanctuary in Lititz, Lancaster County.
According to the Game Commission, the matter of the wolfdogs remains an open investigation.
But Frameli disputes any claim about these canines’ lupine background.
“Everyone knows the father of all dogs in North America was the gray wolf,” said Frameli, who testified Monday for between 60 and 90 minutes. Domestic dogs are known as Canis lupus familiaris, while wolves are classified as Canis lupus.
Frameli called German shepherds “marvelous creatures. They’re magnificent,” and he said he now owns a trio of them, known as Shiloh shepherds, developed by German-American Tina Barber, who trained dogs for the North American Schutzhund Association, the first organization of its kind in the United States, according to ShilohShepherds.info.
Lindsay also is representing Washington native Jerry Sandusky, a former Penn State University assistant football coach, whose child sexual abuse case is currently on appeal.