ST. LOUIS — Three men are facing charges after police said they held a woman captive and beat her inside a church in St. Louis' Patch neighborhood.
The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department said officers responded to a call for help shortly before 1:30 a.m. Feb. 21 to a church in the 300 block of Marceau Street. According to a probable cause statement, the woman had been found bound by rope and bleeding from the head.
Arriving officers met the woman, who said she had been held against her will at a church. She said she was confined to a room, was only given water and was beaten, a probable cause statement said.
Officers and the woman went to the address, where she told them the location of the room. Inside the room was a bottle of water and a bucket filled with feces and urine, court documents said.
The woman identified the three suspects upon entering the building.
Mmunga Fungamali, Pasi Heri and Grace Kipendo were each charged with second-degree kidnapping and third-degree assault.
All of them were being held without bond.
“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,” said one neighbor, who did not want to disclose her name. “That is unfathomable. I cannot believe that that happened so close to my home.
"My heart aches for her. I saw a bunch of police officers parked down the street from that church for hours on Friday night. I’m not sure what they were doing, but it was a huge presence. I just hope that she makes a full recovery and that she’s able to get some justice."
Another woman who lives near the church said the news was "horrible."
“I know the church was sold a few years ago, and those people who run it now have been there for the past three years or so," the woman said. "They do not talk to us. 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.”
No one answered the door when 5 On Your Side’s Robert Townsend stopped by the church Monday afternoon. Townsend also called a number for the pastor that was posed on a sign outside the church but did not hear back.
Police did not say how long the woman was held captive.