For 25 Years He Posted Casting Calls Under a Stage Name. Prosecutors Now Say That Name Was How He Found His Victims.
- 24 felony counts Shane Ryan Gledhill faces in the Santa Barbara County District Attorney's formal complaint, covering seven named minor victims — Noozhawk, Aug. 2026
- $2,000,000 bail set at Gledhill's arraignment, four times the $500,000 bail set at his August 3 arrest — Crime Voice; Noozhawk, Aug. 2026
- Nearly 5 Years the span of the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Office investigation, opened in November 2021 after a then-17-year-old reported abuse — SBCSO press release, Aug. 4, 2026
- 9 survivors sheriff's investigators say they identified — two more than the seven victims named in the DA's formal complaint — SBCSO; Noozhawk, Aug. 2026
Shane Ryan Gledhill spent nearly twenty-five years building an independent film career under two names that were not the one on his driver’s license. As “Shane Ryan” and “Shane Ryan-Reid,” the 46-year-old Lompoc, California resident amassed roughly 120 acting credits and produced more than 150 projects through his own production company, Madsincinema — a résumé that put him on sets with actors including Shelley Duvall, Richard Dreyfuss, and Ed Harris. None of that career history is in dispute.
What is now in dispute is why he kept running casting calls. Santa Barbara County prosecutors allege Gledhill used those stage names — and the casting-call machinery built around them — to identify and gain access to aspiring teenage actresses, several of whom he is accused of sexually abusing. He faces 24 felony counts. He has pleaded not guilty to all of them.
The case took nearly five years to reach an arraignment, and it is not close to finished. A preliminary hearing is set for September 9, and investigators say they are still trying to determine how many more survivors exist beyond the nine they have already identified.
Gledhill’s recruiting apparatus looked, on its face, like any other micro-budget filmmaking operation. He posted open casting calls through four Instagram accounts — @madsincinema, @talkhardcinema, @shaneryanreid, and @shaneryanreidfilms — plus a Facebook page and two websites, madsincinema.com and shaneryanfilms.weebly.com. Aspiring actors could find an audition notice, submit a headshot, and hear back within days. According to the criminal complaint, that speed and informality mattered: investigators allege Gledhill used the “Shane Ryan” identity, distinct from his legal name, to identify and build relationships with aspiring actresses who were still minors.
Several of the survivors interviewed by sheriff’s detectives allege the arrangement went well past a headshot and an audition. According to the complaint, Gledhill is accused of sexually abusing multiple minors he met through the casting-call process, and in some instances of directing them into sexually explicit film content under the same production banner he used to advertise legitimate acting work. None of the specific allegations have been tested at trial, and Gledhill denies all 24 counts.
The investigation that produced those charges began in November 2021, when a then-17-year-old told Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s detectives that Gledhill had abused her beginning when she was 15. Three months later, on February 23, 2022, detectives executed a search warrant at Gledhill’s Lompoc residence and seized what the Sheriff’s Office would later describe only as “thousands of digital files” for forensic review.
What followed was not a fast case. Detectives spent close to five years working through that seizure and following up leads before Gledhill’s August 3, 2026 arrest, ultimately identifying nine survivors, per the Sheriff’s Office’s own account. The formal complaint the District Attorney’s office filed roughly ten days later names seven minor victims across 24 counts — two fewer than the number of survivors sheriff’s investigators say they found. Neither the Sheriff’s Office nor the District Attorney’s office has publicly reconciled that gap, and it is reported here as each agency has stated it, not resolved into a single number.
Gledhill was arrested at his Lompoc residence on August 3, 2026, and booked into county jail on 15 felony counts tied to the sexual abuse and exploitation of children. Bail was set that day at $500,000. The Sheriff’s Office announced the arrest publicly the next morning.
The Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Office has arrested 46-year-old Shane Ryan Gledhill of Lompoc on 15 felony charges related to the sexual abuse and exploitation of children following a nearly five-year investigation.
The case grew from there. Roughly ten days later, the District Attorney’s office filed a formal complaint replacing the original 15 counts with 24, spanning seven named minor victims. Gledhill was arraigned on the new complaint and pleaded not guilty to every count. Bail did not stay at $500,000 — the court set it at $2,000,000, four times the original figure, over the defense’s objection.
Deputy District Attorney Kimberly Dittrich argued for the higher bail directly, telling the court that the pattern prosecutors say they found left little room for release before trial.
“The pattern of predatory behavior directed at multiple successive minors, the use of force and coercion, the retention of sexual images of juveniles and the continued targeting of underage females establish a substantial likelihood of future harm to the public and to potential victims if defendant is released.”
Kimberly Dittrich, Deputy District Attorney, Santa Barbara County — via Noozhawk
Gledhill’s public defender, Julie Rae Manakas of the Santa Barbara County Public Defender’s Office, requested a bail review and asked the court to consider releasing Gledhill on his own recognizance. The court denied that request and set bail at $2,000,000 instead.
District Attorney John Savrnoch, elected in June 2022, oversees the prosecution. California district attorney races are nonpartisan under state law, so no party affiliation attaches to Savrnoch’s office by design — a structural fact worth stating plainly, given this publication’s normal practice of naming officials’ party affiliation wherever one exists.
Santa Barbara County may not be the outer edge of this case. Gledhill’s productions filmed across California’s Central Coast and Los Angeles County, and investigators have said projects tied to his casting calls may extend to locations on the East Coast as well. The Sheriff’s Office has said it believes additional survivors may exist beyond the nine already identified, and has asked anyone with information to come forward.
Gledhill’s own public statements about his filmmaking predate the charges by years and say nothing about the allegations themselves, but several outlets covering the case have cited them as background on the kind of content his productions involved. In a 2018 interview about one of his films, Gledhill described a sequel as “more graphic and more explicit” than the original and said he had “decided to use real penetration” — remarks made about his work as a filmmaker, not testimony in this case, offered here only because multiple outlets have treated it as relevant context.
None of that changes the legal posture of the case in front of Santa Barbara Superior Court. Gledhill has pleaded not guilty to all 24 counts, and a preliminary hearing — the point at which a judge decides whether prosecutors have enough evidence to proceed to trial — is scheduled for September 9, 2026, at the Lompoc courthouse. He remains presumed innocent until that process, or a trial beyond it, says otherwise.
Shane Ryan Gledhill, a Lompoc filmmaker who built a 25-year career under the stage names “Shane Ryan” and “Shane Ryan-Reid,” faces 24 felony counts alleging he used his own casting calls to identify and abuse underage aspiring actresses. He has pleaded not guilty to all of them. The Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office says its investigation, opened in November 2021, identified nine survivors; the District Attorney’s formal complaint names seven. Bail was set at $500,000 at his August 3 arrest and raised to $2,000,000 at arraignment, over the objection of public defender Julie Rae Manakas. District Attorney John Savrnoch’s office — a nonpartisan post under California law — is prosecuting the case, with Deputy DA Kimberly Dittrich arguing the bail increase. A preliminary hearing is set for September 9, 2026.
