South Coast cult leader William Costellia-Kamm is being charged with historical child grooming offences, with police alleging he spent 13 years grooming a girl to procreate with him and build a new religious sect.
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Costellia-Kamm, 73 - known as Little Pebble - was arrested with a woman, 58, on Monday after a six-month investigation by the state's Sex Crimes Squad.
Last week, police raided the headquarters of the infamous religious cult in Bangalee, north of Nowra, and a unit in Sydney's CBD.
At the cult headquarters, police said they searched a home and two sheds, seizing a number of items.
Commander of the state's Sex Crimes Squad detective superintendent Jayne Doherty said their investigation was sparked when a 19-year-old woman came forward last September, reporting to police she had been groomed since she was six until she was 19 by the religious cult founder.
"Police will allege that over that period the child was groomed she was advised by the religious leader and [the woman] that she had been selected to procreate with that religious leader and to built a new sect," Supt Doherty said.
"Police will allege that during a number of those years, the male accused was an inmate in a correctional centre and utilised various methods such as phone calls, letters and using the female accused as a co-accused in that matter to groom that child."
Supt Doherty said the young woman had felt supported enough to come forward to police.
"These are horrendous allegations that any child should be groomed for that," she said.
On Monday afternoon, Supt Doherty said Costellia-Kamm and the 58-year-old woman were "currently being charged", with charges including grooming of a child under 14, grooming a child for unlawful sexual activity and inciting a person to carry out a sexual act without consent.
Costellia-Kamm will also be charged with failing to comply with an extended supervision order, which was in place to prevent him from going to the South Coast cult headquarters.
A timeline of the Little Pebble doomsday cult
German-born Costellia-Kamm termed himself "Little Pebble" and claims he received a "holy message" that he should establish the Order of Saint Charbel, and that one day in the future, he would take over as the last Pope.
In the years the cult was active, the self-proclaimed prophet and a group of around 180 followers established a religious sect on the property at Bangalee.
Despite naming the Order of Saint Charbel a Catholic group, multiple decrees have been issued against Costellia-Kamm's group by the Catholic Church.
Costellia-Kamm claimed to to be able to speak directly to the Virgin Mary, God and Jesus.
He said he received a revelation in the early '90s instructing him to choose "12 queens" and "72 princesses" to "repopulate a royal dynasty".
After serving time in jail and being released in 2014, Costellia-Kamm was back in the news in 2021 after an attempt to return to his "holy land", the property in Bangalee.
He was met with local outrage against his return and corrective Services blocked him from returning to the South Coast, after the Surpreme Court cleared him to do so.
In November that year, he was re-arrested and charged with four counts of failing to comply with a supervision order.
He then returned to court in 2023 after allegedly breaching his supervision orders again, after he allegedly used the internet to make blog posts on his website.
Kate McIlwain
For more than a decade, I've helped the Illawarra Mercury set the news agenda across the region. Currently I'm the paper's health reporter - covering the stories of Illawarra workers and residents in the wake of a global pandemic and at a time where our health systems are stretched to the limit.
For more than a decade, I've helped the Illawarra Mercury set the news agenda across the region. Currently I'm the paper's health reporter - covering the stories of Illawarra workers and residents in the wake of a global pandemic and at a time where our health systems are stretched to the limit.
