Campus Prayer at Univ. of South Florida interrupted by harassers; felony hate crime charges filed against two men

[essentialsaltes]

2 of 3 men who disrupted Muslim prayer at USF identified, police file hate crime charges​

Police said they filed hate crime charges against Christopher Svochak, 40, of Waco, Texas, and Richard Penskoski, 49, of Canyon, Oklahoma. Both have known local addresses in the Tampa Bay area, but no affiliation with USF, according to officials.

Police filed charges against Svochak and Penskosk under Florida State Statute 871.071 for disturbing schools and religious assemblies — which will be upgraded to a felony hate crime. They also filed charges for disorderly conduct and disrupting a school or lawful assembly.

The two men, and the unidentified third suspect, are associated with “the official street preachers.” In a statement, they said they were exercising their constitutional right to preach and speak against Islam.

Cell phone video captured the moment the three men confronted the group of students. The Muslim Students Association at USF said the men shouted slurs at them, waved bacon, and mocked their sacred rituals.

In one clip, a man could be heard saying, “You guys don’t have any bombs on you do you.” Another clip showed one of the men saying, “Spit on Muhammed’s name, he is a scum bag, just like all you Muslim terrorist.” It all lasted about 13 minutes.

 

[Pommer]

2 of 3 men who disrupted Muslim prayer at USF identified, police file hate crime charges​

Police said they filed hate crime charges against Christopher Svochak, 40, of Waco, Texas, and Richard Penskoski, 49, of Canyon, Oklahoma. Both have known local addresses in the Tampa Bay area, but no affiliation with USF, according to officials.

Police filed charges against Svochak and Penskosk under Florida State Statute 871.071 for disturbing schools and religious assemblies — which will be upgraded to a felony hate crime. They also filed charges for disorderly conduct and disrupting a school or lawful assembly.

The two men, and the unidentified third suspect, are associated with “the official street preachers.” In a statement, they said they were exercising their constitutional right to preach and speak against Islam.

Cell phone video captured the moment the three men confronted the group of students. The Muslim Students Association at USF said the men shouted slurs at them, waved bacon, and mocked their sacred rituals.

In one clip, a man could be heard saying, “You guys don’t have any bombs on you do you.” Another clip showed one of the men saying, “Spit on Muhammed’s name, he is a scum bag, just like all you Muslim terrorist.” It all lasted about 13 minutes.

Saw this on the TikTok machine…half thought that it was a “bit”, seeings as how OTT the haranguing was.

 

[Chesterton]

Felony bacon-waving, followed by a press conference. Only in Ame...whatever this place is.

 

[Landon Caeli]

Apparently if you want to burn your own copy of the Koran outdoors, people of that "faith" have the right to steal the book away from you. That happened earlier this week too.

No theft charges even considered.

 

[Landon Caeli]

2 of 3 men who disrupted Muslim prayer at USF identified, police file hate crime charges​

Police said they filed hate crime charges against Christopher Svochak, 40, of Waco, Texas, and Richard Penskoski, 49, of Canyon, Oklahoma. Both have known local addresses in the Tampa Bay area, but no affiliation with USF, according to officials.

Police filed charges against Svochak and Penskosk under Florida State Statute 871.071 for disturbing schools and religious assemblies — which will be upgraded to a felony hate crime. They also filed charges for disorderly conduct and disrupting a school or lawful assembly.

The two men, and the unidentified third suspect, are associated with “the official street preachers.” In a statement, they said they were exercising their constitutional right to preach and speak against Islam.

Cell phone video captured the moment the three men confronted the group of students. The Muslim Students Association at USF said the men shouted slurs at them, waved bacon, and mocked their sacred rituals.

In one clip, a man could be heard saying, “You guys don’t have any bombs on you do you.” Another clip showed one of the men saying, “Spit on Muhammed’s name, he is a scum bag, just like all you Muslim terrorist.” It all lasted about 13 minutes.

From the article:
"Abu Tahir, a student and prayer leader, said the encounter was deeply traumatic. “I had to relive the whole thing again,” he said. “Hearing every voice, every insult, every atrocious claim that they had made against our religion"

Awe, that's so sad. Thing is, as a Catholic, I get to hear my own friends and coworkers rag about my religion my entire life. Anyone see me weeping about it? No. You get over it and move on. It's called being humble.

 

[essentialsaltes]

Thing is, as a Catholic, I get to hear my own friends and coworkers rag about my religion my entire life.

Do they interrupt your religious services to do so?

 

[iluvatar5150]

From the article:
"Abu Tahir, a student and prayer leader, said the encounter was deeply traumatic. “I had to relive the whole thing again,” he said. “Hearing every voice, every insult, every atrocious claim that they had made against our religion"

Awe, that's so sad. Thing is, as a Catholic, I get to hear my own friends and coworkers rag about my religion my entire life. Anyone see me weeping about it? No. You get over it and move on. It's called being humble.

Oh, is that what this is? Humility?

 

[Landon Caeli]

Oh, is that what this is? Humility?

No, this is a verbal reprimand.

 

[Landon Caeli]

Do they interrupt your religious services to do so?

Yes. They do.

• 1989 St. Patrick's Cathedral Incident: Members of the AIDS advocacy groups ACT UP and WHAM disrupted a Sunday Mass led by Cardinal John O'Connor in New York City, resulting in 111 arrests.
• 2015 Las Vegas Incidents: A group of protesters, identified as ex-Muslims turned Christians, disrupted services at multiple Catholic churches across the Las Vegas valley, shouting messages against the Catholic faith and distributing literature.
• March 2024: Protesters disrupted the Easter Vigil Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York, holding a banner and chanting "Free Palestine," leading to their arrest by police, says NBC New York.
• January 2021: Pro-choice activists disrupted a pro-life Mass at St. Joseph Cathedral in Columbus, Ohio, holding signs that said "Fund abortion not cops" before being removed.
• August 2021: A group protested outside a Catholic church in Edmonton, leading to a physical confrontation with parishioners who blocked their entry.

 

[BCP1928]

Apparently if you want to burn your own copy of the Koran outdoors, people of that "faith" have the right to steal the book away from you. That happened earlier this week too.

No theft charges even considered.

Try it with a Bible and get back to me.

 

[essentialsaltes]

Yes. They do.

Those were your friends and coworkers! Wow!

 

[ThatRobGuy]

I still oppose the idea of hate crime laws being leveraged to insulate "circumstances of choice" from criticism and/or mockery.

That aside...

If this was a group of people doing this at some Christian gathering (no matter how hostile the rhetoric), would it be getting escalated to the level of "felony hate crime"?

I've seen videos of some Christian content creators going to areas near college campuses to do demonstration and getting literally physically assaulted, and all that ever comes of it is misdemeanor charges, or the police just break it up and send both parties their separate ways.


I would perhaps be more receptive to the concept of religious affiliation being included under the "hate crime provisions" umbrella if we didn't have a large subset of the country that evaluates everything through a "punching up vs. punching down" lens.

 

[Fervent]

I still oppose the idea of hate crime laws being leveraged to insulate "circumstances of choice" from criticism and/or mockery.

That aside...

If this was a group of people doing this at some Christian gathering (no matter how hostile the rhetoric), would it be getting escalated to the level of "felony hate crime"?

I've seen videos of some Christian content creators going to areas near college campuses to do demonstration and getting literally physically assaulted, and all that ever comes of it is misdemeanor charges, or the police just break it up and send both parties their separate ways.


I would perhaps be more receptive to the concept of religious affiliation being included under the "hate crime provisions" umbrella if we didn't have a large subset of the country that evaluates everything through a "punching up vs. punching down" lens.

This is the start of Islam getting privileged protected status, just like how the threats of violence led to cartoons censoring themselves and capitulating to the Muslim image ban. Next step, Islamic blasphemy laws masquerading as "hate crime" laws.

 

[essentialsaltes]

This is the start of Islam getting privileged protected status

Sure, that's what the caliphate of Tampa Florida is all about. The law itself, obviously, is neutral toward any and all religions.

 

[Fervent]

Sure, that's what the caliphate of Tampa Florida is all about. The law itself, obviously, is neutral toward any and all religions.

The neutrality of the law only matters in how it is applied.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

Laws can be "neutrally worded", but be applied with effects (sometimes intentionally, sometimes incidentally) that are most certainly not "neutral" in a practical sense.


For instance, the laws that criminalized the crack version of cocaine to a much more severe degree than powder cocaine were worded "neutrally", but everyone kind of knew what the actual intent was behind them.


With regards to hate crime laws in particular, a few have slipped up and said the quiet part out loud in the past.

The FBI's hate crimes statistics for 1993, which similarly reported 20% of all hate crimes to be committed against white people, prompted the assistant regional FBI director to decry it as "an abuse of what the hate crime laws were intended to cover", stating that the white victims of these crimes were employing hate crime laws as a means to further penalize minorities.


The intent for hate crime laws has never been "blind application", the underlying intent has always been an offsetting mechanism based on perceptions of "punching up vs. punching down"

 

[Landon Caeli]

Sure, that's what the caliphate of Tampa Florida is all about. The law itself, obviously, is neutral toward any and all religions.

I don't protest. But I would take a vacation to go protest against that abomination of a law.

I'd set it in my calendar right now!

 

[Landon Caeli]

This is the start of Islam getting privileged protected status, just like how the threats of violence led to cartoons censoring themselves and capitulating to the Muslim image ban. Next step, Islamic blasphemy laws masquerading as "hate crime" laws.

It get's even worse:

"The analysis, published Wednesday by the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP), calls on the US to designate the Islamist [Muslim Brotherhood] group a terror organization to thwart its efforts to penetrate all aspects of American life.

“We are now 50 years into the Brotherhood’s 100-year plan to entrench themselves into key institutions in the United States and other Western societies to undermine and destroy our democracy,” said ISGAP’s director, Dr. Charles Asher Small.

The 200-page report claims to have exposed the group’s “civilization jihad” strategy, which involves influencing both educational institutions and government agencies."

Source:
Radical Islamist organization Muslim Brotherhood is infiltrating US colleges to ‘transform Western society from within,’ report warns

Report:

https://isgap.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/MB-Project-Final-251117-01.pdf

 

[Landon Caeli]

Make no mistake!!! If there were ever a country in the history of the world to target for ideological infiltration and eventual global expansion, the United States is absolutely the most perfect target, not only because of our powerful military that could be used to forcefully expand the initiative in the future, but also, we happen to be the easiest country to infiltrate, because we are a nation of immigrants and civil rights, with a large multicultural population, that is used to acculturation, which is the ideal environment for such a process to turn out successful.

 

[Landon Caeli]

Looking at the history of Islam, it has always used the method of acculturation to infiltrate it's Arabian, African, and Asian neighbors. This is the same game being repeated, over and over...

...We have a problem on our hands.

Changes of Culture In Islamic History | History of Islam Changes of Culture In Islamic History | History of Islam