From left: Grace Kipendo, Mmunga Fungamali and Pasi Heri are facing kidnapping and assault charges after a woman was found bound and with a head wound on Feb. 21, 2024, in St. Louis. She told cops she was held against her will at Mount of Olives Ministry church. (Mug shots: St. Louis Metropolitan Police; Screenshot: KDSK/YouTube)
The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department arrested three people after uncovering what was described as a cult-like church where officers found women whose faces were covered with veils were being held captive, according to reports.
Grace Kipendo, 28, Mmunga Fungamali, 25, and Pasi Heri, 32, are facing kidnapping and assault charges.
St. Louis police officers were called a little before 1:30 a.m. Feb. 21 after a woman had been found bound with ropes and bleeding from the head, a probable cause statement said. She told officers she had been confined against her will to a room in a church in the 300 block of Marceau Street. The woman said she was only given water and was beaten. She had an “obvious wound” to her head. Cops went to the church where she showed them the room where she was being held.
The room had a bottle of water and a bucket with feces and urine inside, the affidavit said. Officers then arrested Kipendo, Fungamali and Heri who were inside the church and took them to the St. Louis City Justice Center where they are being held without bond.
Kipendo had a bond hearing Monday where more wild details came out, according to a report by the Riverfront Times. Assistant Circuit Attorney Chris Faerber reportedly described the Mount of Olives Ministry church as cult-like. Faerber said the churchgoers called women “angels” and the “good angels” wore white veils in a “white room.”
“Officers tried to lift their veils to check on their well-being and the women started screaming,” Faerber reportedly said.
Faerber told the judge one of the responding officers said: “If I hadn’t seen this with my own eyes, I wouldn’t have believed it,” the local news website reported.
One of the women escaped and flagged down a passerby who called police.
Kipendo’s attorney Chris Combs reportedly said at the hearing that he was sympathetic to the victim but his client was not involved in any kidnapping or assault. He claimed Kipendo and the other two men were taken into custody because of a language barrier. Church services are held in Swahili, he said. Several members of the church, including the victim’s mother and sister, were there to support the suspects.
Faerber said the victim’s family had recently brought her from Kansas City to St. Louis for mental health treatment. They put her in the church for what they termed as “healing,” Faerber reportedly said.
A judge ordered Kipendo to be held without bond. The other two defendants will have their bond hearing when a Swahili interpreter can be present, records show.
Pastor Danny Stephen told the Riverfront Times that one of the women was slapped — but not by any of three men arrested.
“Why are you holding these three people, innocent people?” he said, according to the story.
If there was anything untoward going on inside the church as is alleged, neighbors didn’t seem to notice until there was a large police presence after the woman was found.
“They were in services on Sunday. I heard singing and kids outside playing, so I didn’t seem as if anything was out of the ordinary,” one neighbor told local NBC affiliate KDSK. “That is unfathomable. I cannot believe that that happened so close to my home.”
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Another neighbor told the outlet the church was sold to the present group about three years ago.
“They do not talk to us,” she said Monday in an interview with KDSK. “They have washed their clothes and put them on my backyard fence, and I’ve asked them to stop that, but otherwise, they do not talk to us. I do know there are people there all the time and they’re always outside, and the fact that they’re not there this afternoon is odd.”
The church has a Facebook page and a YouTube channel with over 1,000 subscribers.
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