A new photo of disgraced former Texas pastor Robert Morris shows the convicted sex offender with a black eye. The Texas Public Sex Offender website posted an updated photo of Morris on Tuesday. Morris’ right eye is heavily bruised. Chron has reached out to Morris’ attorney Bill Mateja for comment.
Morris was the lead pastor of North Texas megachurch Gateway Church for 24 years after he founded the church in 2000. The pastor also had a close relationship with President Donald Trump, serving as a spiritual adviser to the Trump White House and hosting the president at Gateway Church in 2020.
However, Morris resigned as senior pastor in 2024 after he was publicly accused of sexually assaulting then-12-year-old Cindy Clemishire over several years beginning in 1982. At the time, Morris was a traveling evangelist staying with the victim’s family in Hominy, Oklahoma. Clemishire first told her story to the blog Wartburg Watch, which covers abuse within the church.
Morris pleaded guilty to five counts of lewd and indecent acts with a child in October 2025 and received a 10-year suspended sentence, with the first six months to be served in the Osage County Jail.
A new photo of disgraced former Texas pastor Robert Morris shows the convicted sex offender with a black eye. (Irwin Thompson/TNS)
“While you built a megachurch, authored books, and gained fame, I dropped out of college, endured divorces, and struggled with self-worth, battled depression, made countless poor decisions, and added more shame to my life,” Clemishire said to Morris in October. “And when I finally spoke, you tried to call it consensual. Robert, the abuse itself was horrific. But when you and your church rewrote the story, you multiplied the harm.”
Morris’ legal team expressed that the former pastor was “at peace with his sentence.”
“In an odd way, [Morris] looks forward to fulfilling this penance, namely going to jail for his past sin and crime,” Morris’ team said in October.
Morris was released from Osage County Jail in March and is serving the rest of his 10-year sentence on probation. According to Morris’ rap sheet, he now lives in Graford, Texas, about 80 miles west of Fort Worth.
However, some aspects of the case are still playing out in court. Clemishire sued Morris and Gateway Church for defamation in June 2025. The Fifth Court of Appeals ultimately ruled in Gateway’s favor in August, dismissing almost all of the claims Clemishire brought forward. According to the Dallas Morning News, Clemishire’s attorneys will soon request that the Texas Supreme Court review the case.
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This article originally published at Texas ex-pastor Robert Morris shown with black eye in sex offender registry photo.