'Devil in disguise': So-called 'reverend' preying on women for contracting services | Investigation

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- The Action News Investigative team has been working diligently to help a group of women who allege a local contractor took their money and did substandard work or no work at all.

His name is Leonard Chambers. And the group of women said he calls himself a preacher who first used spirituality to make them feel comfortable before ripping them off.

"If I seen him right now, I will smack him silly. I really would. I would smack that man silly," said Sharon Dingess of Tioga-Nicetown.

"He's a devil in disguise," added Pearl Fletcher. "That's it, you know, a devil in disguise."

Fletcher showed the Investigative Team her backyard, where cracked and unlevel concrete is still visible.

"He explained that he was a reverend that does contracting, and the proceeds go back to the church," said Fletcher.

She contracted with Leonard Chambers and his Perfect Home Improvement company in June 2024 to have the cracked concrete removed and a new slab poured.

The scribbled on his contract states: "Church Contract" and "Church Oriented Construction Company."

He charged Fletcher $7,100. She gave him $5,300 to get started.

"Then I saw the work he was doing. I said, 'Oh no, no...this is not what I saw on the pictures he showed me,'" she said.

That work was on neighbor Sharon Dingess' porch.

Dingess said she met Chambers when he approached her at the Roosevelt Boulevard Home Depot last June.

"He just walked up to me and said, 'You look like you're a child of God, and God sent me over here because I think you need some help,'" she recalled.

Dingess told him she needed porch repairs. She gave him her address to come and take a look.

And, when she returned home, he was there, she recalled.

Dingess said the two agreed on a price of $1,100 to have the Astro Turf on her porch removed, the porch leveled, and new boards laid down.

"Look at this mess," Dingess said while showing our Chad Pradelli. "And look at this stuff cracking up right here."

The turf was not removed, and even worse, a box left behind showed Chambers used interior flooring to cover the outdoor porch floor.

"He said, 'But this is the right stuff for your porch,'" explained Dingess. "I don't know. I trusted this man, and this is what this man did to me and my friends."

The Investigative Team has learned Chambers' company, Perfect Home Improvement, is not licensed in Pennsylvania.

But more troubling, he has a lengthy criminal record.

Court records reveal he has a guilty pleas for rape in 1992 and aggravated assault in 2017. He also has charges of theft by deception and home improvement fraud in 2019, among other crimes. Chambers has also been in and out of jail over the years.

"Oh my God," said Fletcher when learning about his past. "To hear that, that's horrible."

Chambers declined to comment when reached by phone. The Investigative Team went to his house. His wife told us they were now separated, and he was no longer living there.

"I am trying to get in touch with Leonard Chambers," said Chad Pradelli, speaking through a doorbell system at Chambers' home.

"I just washed my hands of him. Just bad news," said the woman who identified herself as Chambers' wife.

Fletcher said that after canceling the contract with Chambers, he never refunded the deposit.

She received a civil judgment for $5,300, but trying to collect has been difficult.

Our investigation also found two other civil judgments awarded against Chambers. One of the victims told us she is still waiting to collect as well.

"Now my next step is I have to employ a sheriff, which starts at $84, and then see what they can do," said Fletcher.

The Pennsylvania Attorney General's office tells us it has received four complaints for Perfect Home Improvement since 2018.

So far, there's no word of a criminal investigation.

Two other women have also since come forward to the Investigative Team, alleging Chambers took money for other work, but he never started.