All four Boston Teamsters have been found not guilty on all charges in the "Top Chef" extortion trial, a federal jury decided this morning.

The Teamsters had been accused of terrorizing the set of the Bravo reality show "Top Chef" in 2014 with physical violence and threats of death and bomb scares in a failed attempt to extort the nonunion production into hiring them for truck driving jobs, according to prosecutors.

"We are disappointed in today’s verdict," acting U.S. Attorney William Weinreb said in a statement. " The government believed, and continues to believe, that the conduct in this case crossed the line and constituted a violation of federal law. The defendants’ conduct was an affront to all of the hard-working and law-abiding members of organized labor. We will continue to aggressively prosecute extortion in all its forms to ensure that Boston remains a safe and welcoming place to do business. I would like to thank the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General for their work investigating this case."

Lawyers for defendants John Fidler, 52, Daniel Redmond, 48, Robert Cafarelli, 46, and Michael Ross, 62, did not put on a defense.

However, their legal teams successfully insisted through cross-examination of government witnesses and in closing arguments that their clients lawfully picketed to replace nonunion production assistants who for weeks had been performing the work the men were demanding.

A 44-year-old U.S. Supreme Court decision forbids charging union members with anti-racketeering Hobbs Act extortion if their behavior, however abhorrent, is in the pursuit of a legitimate labor objective.

U.S. District Court Judge Douglas P. Woodlock said the exception to the Supreme Court’s 1973 decision, under which the Local 25 members were charged with attempted extortion and conspiracy to extort, is “narrow.”

He told the trial teams that jurors were facing “a very complex area of law” in their deliberations.

The charges stem from incidents that allegedly occurred between June 5 and 10, 2014, while “Top Chef’ was filming the seventh episode of its 12th season, which for the first time was based in Boston.

The case, with its mixed cast of Teamsters and Hollywood stars, turned a spotlight on the administration of Mayor Martin J. Walsh, who appeared on the episode of the show.

A network executive who oversees production of the show testified that a top lieutenant of the mayor pressured him to hire unwanted Teamsters to drive trucks, saying the famously pro-labor Democrat was in an “uncomfortable situation" for having guest-starred on the nonunion reality show.

“At one point he asked if I could take the mayor out of the show. I said that wasn't possible," David G. O'Connell, executive vice president of production management for NBC Universal, said of Kenneth Brissette, director of the Mayor's Office of Tourism, Sports and Entertainment.

“He kept reiterating that this would all go away if we just made a deal. “I kept saying, no, it's not going to happen," O'Connell said. “The Teamsters had been sniffing around and wanted to make a deal with us. It's a nonunion show and we were fully staffed at that point."

Brissett was identified by prosecutors as an “unindicted co-conspirator” for pressuring “Top Chef” producers to hire Teamsters while temporarily withholding their permits to film around the city. He is currently on paid leave from his post while awaiting a January trial for his alleged attempted extortion of the “Boston Calling” music festival in a separate labor dispute.

Walsh spokeswoman Laura Oggeri had declined to comment on O'Connell's claims. Two years ago, Walsh's office issued a statement that read, “Mayor Walsh was fully supportive of the ‘Top Chef' filming and was happy to participate in the show."

Jurors in the case heard compelling and emotional testimony from high-profile witnesses including “Top Chef” host Padma Lakshmi and show judge Gail Simmons.

Lakshmi said she was “petrified” Fidler was going to punch her in her “pretty face,” while Simmons broke down crying on the stand recalling how scared she was when Teamsters surrounded her vehicle.

Location manager Derek Cunningham testified he began sleeping with a knife under his bed. A man trying to deliver meat to the Steel & Rye restaurant in Milton, where the Teamsters were protesting a “Top Chef’ shoot on June 10, 2014, claimed one of them threatened to plant a bomb on his truck.

Others testified they were threatened with death and vicious beatdowns.

A crew member said 11 tires on nine rented production vans were slashed while the Teamsters were at the Steel & Rye.

Before sending them to their deliberations, Woodlock told jurors to remember the witnesses were “more exotic than your everyday fare, but they’re still people.”

The jury was out nearly 20 hours since Thursday after hearing six days of testimony from 18 witnesses called by prosecutors for the U.S. Attorney's Office.

The 12 deliberating jurors – nine women and three men — were culled from a pool of 92 originally summonsed from Cape Ann to Cape Cod.

If convicted, Fidler, Redmond, Cafarelli and Ross would have faced up to 20 years in federal prison.

Mark Harrington, Charlestown-based Local 25’s former business agent, pleaded guilty in December to attempted extortion and was sentenced by Woodlock to six months’ home confinement as part of two years’ probation.

The judge called that sentence “a fair price” to pay, even as he questioned whether it would serve as a deterrent to future union actions.

DEVELOPING…