Manor man captured hiding in Herminie house after eluding law enforcement

A Manor man was captured late Wednesday night while trying to hide in a Herminie house bedroom after eluding law enforcement for about eight hours when an attempt was made to serve him with an arrest warrant at an ice cream shop in North Hempfield, the Westmoreland County Sheriff’s Department said.

Donald T. Sciulli, 41, was arrested after a brief struggle with deputies who had got into the locked upstairs bedroom door, said Chief Deputy Sheriff Jennifer Shipley.

Sciulli refused to exit the house when sheriff’s deputies surrounded the structure sometime after 8 p.m. and ordered him to surrender, Shipley said.

The chief deputy said that the department had received information that Sciulli had fled to a house in Herminie. She did not know how he had traveled from the North Hempfield area to Herminie in Sewickley, when he left his car at Tastyland along Route 66. That vehicle was later towed and impounded Wednesday night.

Sciulli was placed in the Westmoreland County Prison, pending charges the sheriff’s department plans to file, Shipley said.

The incident began around 12:30 p.m. at Tastyland when the sheriff’s fugitive unit went to the Tastyland, where they saw Sciulli pull his vehicle into a parking space. When deputies moved to arrest him, Sciulli ran and jumped over an embankment.

“He saw the deputy and took off behind Tastyland and into the woods,” Shipley said.

Sciulli was accused of strangling a woman on June 28 in a domestic dispute in Elizabeth Township, Allegheny County. The sheriff’s department had information that Sciulli would be at the Tastyland on Wednesday afternoon, said Shipley, who declined to elaborate.

Numerous state police troopers and sheriff’s deputies searched woods and fields for several hours Wednesday before calling off the search shortly before 7 p.m. A state police helicopter, a K-9 team and all-terrain vehicles were deployed in the search near the intersection of Route 66 and the Amos K. Hutchinson Bypass. Sciulli was able to escape the perimeter that law enforcement had set up around that area, Shipley said.

Elizabeth Township police had charged Sciulli with felony counts of strangulation and flight to avoid apprehension or trial, a misdemeanor count of simple assault and summary charge of harassment, according to court documents. In that incident, Sciulli also fled officers into nearby woods, but was captured when he injured his leg, according to the criminal complaint filed in the case.

He was arraigned before Forest Hills District Judge Lisa Caulfield and freed on a nonmonetary bond.

Elizabeth Township Police Chief Ken Honick could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Sciulli was scheduled for a preliminary hearing before Elizabeth Township District Judge Beth Mills on July 30.

In addition to the charges filed in Allegheny County, authorities in Westmoreland County have filed criminal charges against Sciulli in 18 incidents since 2002, according to documents on the Pennsylvania Unified Judicial System website.