Controversial so-called street preachers charged with hate crimes in British Columbia
After years of complaints in Ontario, Steven Ravbar and Matthew Carapella have resurfaced in B.C.
A pair of so-called street preachers known for verbally harassing women in Ontario are now facing hate crime charges in relation to allegations they interfered with worshippers at two churches in B.C.'s Lower Mainland last fall.
According to court documents obtained by CBC News, Steven Ravbar and Matthew Carapella are accused of mischief "motivated by bias, prejudice or hate based on sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression" for a pair of incidents dating back to a Sunday in November 2024.
The pair — whose beliefs trace back to an apocalyptic American preacher — last made headlines in 2022 when they were convicted of public nuisance in London, Ont., for assailing women with comments on how they should behave and dress.
They now appear to be living in a hotel in Langley, B.C. — the address both Ravbar and Carapella gave on release documents signed last weekend after a first appearance in provincial court.
'It's obviously concerning'
According to a Surrey Police Service spokesperson, the investigation began as a Surrey RCMP file on Nov. 3 when officers were called to two churches in the Cloverdale area.
Ravbar and Carapella were accused of causing a disturbance by trying to enter the Sonrise and Hillside churches.
"It appears that they went into these places of worship and espoused views based on bias against someone's gender and their religious belief and that interrupted the proceedings in the churches," Sgt. Tige Pollock told CBC News.
Pollock said investigators consulted with B.C.'s provincial hate crimes unit before drawing up charge recommendations, which were ultimately approved by Crown last month.
"It's obviously concerning," Pollock said.
"People live in Canada because they enjoy certain freedoms, and one of those is freedom of religious worship. And so it's very concerning when someone decides to take their hate or biased opinion to a place of worship where people should feel safe."
Ravbar and Carapella are charged under Section 430(4.1) of the Criminal Code — one of a number of offences targeting hate crimes, which the RCMP define as criminal acts "against a person or property that is motivated in whole or in part by hate or bias against an identifiable group."
Consideration of a hate-based motivation would come into play during sentencing if the charges were to result in a conviction. The offence is punishable by a prison term of up to 10 years.
According to court documents, both men were released pending trial on promises to stay away from Hillside and Sonrise churches and "not to go to any church or property while services are being conducted unless ... registered as a member of that specific congregation."
Their next court appearance is Aug. 1.
'A total perversion'
Ravbar and Carapella first made headlines in Ontario almost a decade ago when they drew complaints from London residents for standing on street corners and berating passersby through an amplifier.
According to a CBC story from 2017, Carapella was heard telling a woman wearing pants that her attire was "a total perversion in God's eyes." He also admitted to confronting any passerby who he thought might be gay, calling them an "abomination."
The men were accused of disrupting services at various churches in the London area and the pastor at one chapel said he had to get a trespass order against Ravbar and Carapella after they confronted him and harassed female parishioners, who they called "whores."
At that point, women told CBC News that Carapella and Ravbar berated them for wearing a skirt or makeup, or having a short hair cut. London's mayor said their behaviour amounted to gender discrimination.
The next year, the two men were arrested during a trip to Louisiana, where police said they were asked to leave at least three churches after disrupting services in the city of Shreveport.
In 2019, back in London, Carapella and Ravbar were charged under the city's public nuisance bylaw. They were ultimately convicted and fined a collective $7,250.
'The world is about to end'
Coverage of Ravbar and Carapella caught the attention of John Collins, who runs an organization dedicated to exposing the hateful legacy of William Branham, the American doomsday evangelist whose sermons appear to have served as inspiration for the street preachers.
In the years after the Second World War, Branham influenced a movement called Latter Rain that increasingly deviated from mainstream Christianity.
During his career, Branham had connections to the Ku Klux Klan and Jim Jones, who led more than 900 of his followers to kill themselves in Guyana in a mass suicide known as the Jonestown Massacre.
Collins — who is based out of Jeffersonville, Ind. — rejected his own family's embrace of Branham's teachings.
"The belief system is that the world is about to end. Females are the cause of its destruction and it is closely tied to hate groups and hate ideology," Collins told the CBC this week.
"This movement does not recruit by normal means. You won't find advertisements or publications to join the cult. Instead what happens is it either recruits by producing offspring through marriage, or you have these splinter cells that emerge because of Branham's recordings."
According to a London Free Press profile, Carapella — who is now 38 — was a former Western University football player with a good job in his family's development business when he decided to forsake his previous life and devote himself to God after waking up one day with a hangover.
Ravbar, who turned 57 last week, was Carapella's Grade 7 teacher.
In 2017, Carapella told CBC News that the older man introduced him to recordings of Branham's sermons.
"The first sermon I heard by brother Branham, I rejoiced," Carapella said. "That's what I've been searching for my whole life."
The two men now appear to live in a chain hotel in the centre of Langley, where a front desk clerk told CBC News they had been staying for an extended period of time.
Ravbar and Carapella did not respond to a note left at the hotel by a CBC reporter, and a clerk later said the two men did not want any further contact from the media.
Collins described the men as a "cell" of two.
"When I see this with Steven Ravbar and Matthew Carapella, I'm saddened for them in that they probably can't help what they're doing — they're under the mind control," he said.
"But they're causing such a chaos in the cities that they wreak havoc in, that I feel sorry for the people who are in the city."
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With files from Andrew Lupton