Gateway Church founder Robert Morris and accuser Cindy Clemishire attend court hearing
.JPG "Gateway Church founder Robert Morris enters the Osage County Courthouse in Pawhuska, Oklahoma, accompanied by his wife, Debbie Morris, and his attorney, Mack Martin, on Friday, May 9, 2025.")
Gateway Church founder Robert Morris appeared before an Osage County, Oklahoma, judge for a short court hearing Friday morning on child sexual abuse charges.
The judge set the date for the former Texas megachurch pastor’s next appearance on Sept. 4, CBS News reported. That will be a preliminary hearing where the prosecution will present evidence to try to establish probable cause that the case should go to trial.
Morris has already entered a not guilty plea in the case, according to court records. Friday’s pre-preliminary hearing also was an opportunity for the attorneys to discuss or offer a plea agreement, but no such agreement was reached. The hearing before Judge Cindy Pickerill lasted about one minute, the Dallas Morning News reported.
Morris resigned from his position as lead pastor at the North Texas megachurch last June after Cindy Clemishire publicly accused him of sexually abusing her as a child in the 1980s, beginning when she was 12 years old in her Oklahoma home.
An Oklahoma grand jury indicted Morris on five counts of lewd or indecent acts with a child in March. The 63-year-old former pastor turned himself in to authorities March 17 and was booked into the Osage County Jail. He was released on $50,000 bond a short time later.
The victim, Cindy Clemishire, attended Friday’s hearing with her parents and other family members and friends, CBS reported.
When she arrived at the courthouse, Clemishire said that the hearing was “a long time coming,” according to CBS.
Friday’s hearing was Morris’ first public appearance since he resigned from the Southlake-based Gateway Church last year.
As Morris walked to the Osage County Courthouse accompanied by his attorney and his wife, Debbie, on Friday morning, he declined to speak to reporters, according to the Dallas Morning News.
“I’m sorry, I can’t,” Morris said.
Defense attorney Mack Martin said, “He’s not talking,” the Dallas Morning News reported.
Morris’ abuse of Clemishire allegedly began in December 1982. Morris was a traveling evangelist who visited Clemishire and her family in Hominy, Oklahoma, authorities said in a news release. Morris’ indictment alleges that the sexual misconduct began that Christmas and continued for the next four years.
The statute of limitations does not apply in the case because Morris did not reside in or inhabit Oklahoma for any period of time, the Oklahoma Attorney General’s Office said. The prosecution is based on a frontier-era law, which Morris’ attorneys are expected to challenge. The Oklahoma state law was intended to prevent people from coming into the state to commit crimes and then leaving.
In his only public statement about the case last June, after the Wartburg Watch published Clemishire’s story, Morris told the Christian Post that he admitted engaging in “inappropriate sexual behavior with a young lady.”
Morris founded Gateway church in 2000.
This story was originally published May 9, 2025 at 11:59 AM.
