Gateway fires four elders, saying they have information about Morris abuse allegations

Gateway Church has fired four of its elders after receiving a report from a law firm hired to conduct an internal investigation into the alleged sexual abuse of a 12-year-old girl by its founder, a church leader announced Saturday.

Church elder Tra Willbanks said during the service that all but three of the church's elders either knew that former senior pastor Robert Morris had sexual contact with a 12-year-old or that they had received some information about the situation and “failed to investigate further.” “.

“We have decided to draw a very clear line here based on biblical and moral values ​​and the values ​​of our church family, and we can report to you that to date no person serves, is employed or employed as an elder in either group works at Gateway Church,” Willbanks said to applause from the audience at the megachurch’s Southlake campus.

The removal came after Haynes Boone, a law firm hired by the church to investigate the allegations, submitted a report to a subcommittee of elders including Willbanks, Kenneth Fambro and Dane Minor. Willbanks gave a summary of the report to parishioners at Saturday's service in Gateway.

Willbanks said the church is also cooperating with criminal investigations.

“I can report that neither the church nor its current leadership are the subject of this criminal investigation,” he said.

Oldest Thomas Miller, Gayland Lawshe, Kevin Grove and Jeremy Carrasco were no longer visible on Gateway's elders page on the church's website as of 4:30 p.m. Saturday.

Willbanks came on stage about 10 minutes into the Gateway performance on Saturday to give the recap. Willbanks also praised Cindy Clemishire, the woman who came forward in June to report that Morris sexually abused her in the 1980s. He said she was brave for coming forward, a statement that was met with applause by community members.

He condemned Morris with the strongest language the church has yet used. Willbanks said that on the day Clemishire came forward with allegations that Morris had abused her in the 1980s, beginning when she was 12, Morris directed church staff to release a statement to minimize her claims.

“Robert Morris directed Gateway staff to release a statement aimed at minimizing the severity of Cindy's allegations in a final attempt to hide the truth,” he said. “Cindy was not a consenting adult, but a 12-year-old child and victim of sexual abuse.”

Willbanks said the elders were able to independently verify elements of Clemishire's story and asked for a meeting with Morris, who resigned without meeting with the elders.

Morris also declined to meet with Haynes Boone during his investigation, Willbanks said.

The church will revise its constitution and leadership structure, Willbanks said. In the past, the church was led by a group of elders consisting of both church employees in other capacities and those with full-time employment elsewhere. Going forward, all voting members of the Gateway elders board will be non-employees, Willbanks said.

“We need to instill that level of independence and objectivity in our body of elders, and that has been lacking in recent years,” he said.

Willbanks said the staff will no longer serve as elders, with the exception of the church's future senior pastor or possibly a senior pastor. Willbanks said both positions would involve non-voting elders.

“The truth is that the events of the last few months have shown that there has been a massive failure of leadership and accountability here at Gateway Church,” Willbanks said near the end of his remarks. “It was a failure of culture, and we must be honest with ourselves and acknowledge that our culture allowed this truth to be buried for too long.”

Willbanks also said the investigation found no additional incidents of sexual abuse by Morris.

“To our knowledge, there are no other victims of Robert Morris other than Cindy Clemishire,” Willbanks said.

Willbanks said Gateway's culture became centralized around Morris, allowing the truth to be hidden for years.

“When a church focuses on just one pastor, it loses its way.” Willbanks said. “Unfortunately, over the last few months we have come to the realization that at some point in the past, the culture at Gateway has become one in which power is centralized and the leader at the top is surrounded by people who want to protect them, some of them “them at any cost.”

In June, Clemishire told Christian blog The Wartburg Watch that Morris sexually abused her from 1982 to 1987, starting when she was 12. Morris founded Gateway Church in 2000.

The news has attempted to reach Morris at multiple phone numbers and sent letters to four addresses listed for him in public records, but has received no response. The news sent a letter seeking comment to a registered address of each of the church's seven current elders listed as of Oct. 31, but received no response.

On June 28, Gateway Church said in a notice posted on its website that four of its elders would temporarily resign following Haynes Boone's advice. Three of them – Kevin Grove, Steve Dulin and Gayland Lawshe – were elders between 2005 and 2007 when Clemishire said she contacted Morris to confront him about the alleged abuse and possibly sue him. Steve Dulin was later fired.

“As Haynes and Boone begin their work, they have recommended that any Gateway Church elder with a potential conflict of interest take a temporary leave of absence from the Board of Elders,” a statement on Gateway’s website said at the time. “This includes all elders with a relationship conflict and the elders who served on the board from 2005 to 2007.”

Since June, the church has been named as a defendant in several lawsuits unrelated to Morris' abuse allegations.

The latest lawsuit, filed Oct. 4 by former Gateway members, accused the church and its former leaders of reneging on their commitment to donate 15% of the church's tithes to foreign missionary work.

The lawsuit names four Gateway Church leaders as defendants: Robert Morris, Thomas Lane, Kevin Grove and Steve Dulin.

She also accuses Grove of telling an auditor hired by the church to “stop reconciling the accounts” after he allegedly became aware of financial irregularities.

On Oct. 5, a church elder said during a Saturday service that the church was in the process of joining the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability. According to its website, this group requires churches to make audited financial statements available to the public upon written request and to have a governing body with a majority of independent board members.

Adrian Ashford covers faith and religion in North Texas for The Dallas Morning News as part of a partnership with Report for America.