Disgraced Texas megachurch pastor Robert Morris has been released from an Oklahoma prison after serving only 6 months of a 10-year sentence for sexually abusing a 12-year-old girl named Cindy Clemishire in Oklahoma in the 1980s.
Osage County officials say 64-year-old Robert Preston Morris was released from prison early Tuesday.
Under his plea agreement, he received a 10-year suspended sentence and must register as a sex offender while being supervised by Texas authorities through an interstate compact. He was also ordered to pay his incarceration costs and restitution to the victim.
Prosecutors say Morris started abusing Clemishire in 1982 when she was just 12. At the time, Morris was a traveling evangelist staying with her family in Hominy, Oklahoma.
Morris went on to become the senior pastor of Gateway Church in a Dallas-Fort Worth suburb, leading one of the nation’s largest megachurches.
Clemishire had tried to tell her story many years before but had been largely ignored. She told CBN News it also took years for her to fully grasp what she endured. “I was 12,” she said. “I was not a teenager yet. And I told (adults what happened) when I was 17, and it did go all the way through…the full year of being 16.”
In 2025, Morris had initially pleaded “not guilty” to five charges of lewd or indecent acts with a child.
At that time, Clemishire testified before Texas lawmakers in the state Capitol, “It wasn’t until, even with years of counseling, that I could accept the term ‘abuse.’ I was 35 the first time I truly accepted and believed that (Morris) abused me and it was criminal.”
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Morris resigned from his church leadership role in June 2024 when the victim’s allegations gained traction. He was indicted in 2025 by an Oklahoma grand jury. He eventually pleaded guilty to 5 counts of sexually abusing Clemishire when she was a girl.
The victim, who is now in her 50s, said in a statement when Morris was sentenced that “justice has finally been served, and the man who manipulated, groomed, and abused me as a 12-year-old innocent girl is finally going to be behind bars.”
Even though Morris is out of prison, Jeff Leach, a Dallas-based attorney who represents Clemishire, said they are “heartened to know that he (Morris) still has nearly ten years of probation as well as a lifetime ahead of being publicly registered as a sex offender.”
Leach added that Clemishire plans to continue to seek justice through civil courts. “She rightfully seeks full accountability not only for Robert and the crimes he committed against her as a young child, but also for the other individuals who harbored him, covered for him, lied for him and even in some cases attacked Cindy on his behalf,” Leach said.
In a statement released on Tuesday by one of Morris’ attorneys, Bill Mateja, Morris apologized to Clemishire and her family, praising them for coming forward.
“What I did to Cindy decades ago was wrong. There is no other word for it, and there is no excuse for it. I am deeply sorry,” Morris said. “I have carried the weight of that wrong for a very long time, and I am grateful – genuinely grateful – that the Clemishires had the courage to bring this into the light.”
“Many years ago, I sought their forgiveness privately, and as Cindy’s father recently noted, he extended that grace to me – a grace I did not deserve and have never taken for granted.”
In 2025, Clemishire said Morris caused severe damage to her life that she’s still working through. She said, “In my victim statement, I told Robert that, not only did he steal my innocence and basically murdered the woman I was supposed to grow into…” She points out that during courtroom proceedings, Morris had the opportunity to openly, directly apologize to her, but did not do so.
At that time, referring to Jesus’ words about forgiveness, she said, “Again, 70 times seven… I think it’s because the wound — something triggers something, and we have to forgive again, and that forgiveness is not for him. It is for me. It is not about his life, and if I ever say, ‘I forgive Robert,’ that doesn’t mean I like him, that doesn’t mean I condone what he did, that doesn’t mean that I think he should be a free man roaming the earth without any consequences. It has nothing to do with Robert’s life, and has everything to do with mine and my relationship with God, and my relationship with my friends and family.”
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