Police were called to the Patch neighborhood in south St. Louis over the weekend after a woman was found bound by ropes and bleeding from the head. She later told police she had been confined against her will at a church in the city.
Three men have been charged with felony kidnapping and assult related to the incident. Pasi Heri, 32, of Dutchtown, Grace Kipendo, 28, of Arnold, and Mmunga Fungamali, 25, whose partial address listed in court records suggests he is from Canada, have all been charged with felony kidnapping and assault.
The men were charged Sunday.
The injured woman told police that she had been locked in a room in a church on Minnesota Avenue in the Patch neighborhood. She said she was given only water and was beaten. Officers observed "an obvious wound to her head," which the woman said she suffered while confined. English was not the woman's first language, police wrote in their probable cause statement, but she managed to communicate these details to them.
The Minnesota Avenue address listed in the probable cause statement appears to be a private residence, not a church. Police say they went there with the victim and she identified Heri, Kipendo and Fungamali as the men who confined and beat her. Police also observed a bucket that had been used as an improvised toilet in the room where she had been held.
An arrest warrant has been issued for the three men and a judge has ordered they be held with no bond.
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