HOUSTON (TX)
Baptist News Global [Jacksonville FL]
December 29, 2023
By Mark Wingfield and Jeff Brumley
A confidential settlement has been reached in the lawsuit accusing prominent Southern Baptist figure Paul Pressler of sexually abusing a teenage member of his Houston church multiple times beginning in 1977, the Texas Tribune reported Dec. 29.
Duane Rollins filed the lawsuit in 2017 accusing Pressler, a former Texas judge and a key architect of the conservative resurgence of the Southern Baptist Convention, of molesting him numerous times beginning when he was 14. Rollins said the sexual assaults included oral and anal sex which began after he enrolled in a Bible study led by Pressler.
Documents uncovered during the six-year court case disclosed that leaders of First Baptist Church of Houston were aware of Pressler’s alleged sexual activity with young men dating back to 2004, the Tribune reported in March.
The publication reported in November that Jared Woodfill, Pressler’s former law partner, also knew of the of the allegations about Pressler without reporting them. Woodfill is an outspoken anti-LGBTQ opponent currently running for the Texas House of Representatives.
The confidential settlement includes not only Pressler, now 93, but also Woodfill, the SBC and its Executive Committee.
According to the latest Tribune report by Robert Downen, the confidential settlement includes not only Pressler, now 93, but also Woodfill, the SBC and its Executive Committee.
The Tribune reported that “legal representatives for the Southern Baptist Convention and its Executive Committee confirmed that they had ‘entered into a confidential settlement agreement’ despite being ‘fully prepared’ to proceed to the trial for the suit, which was scheduled for February after being postponed twice this year.”
A statement from the Executive Committee cited “several factors” that “made settlement the more prudent choice.”
“Chief among those factors was the horrendous nature of the abuse allegations, the likelihood that counsel for the SBC and Executive Committee would have to confront and cross-examine abuse survivors, the Executive Committee’s current financial condition, and the willingness of multiple insurance carriers to contribute to the terms of the settlement.”
The SBC and the Executive Committee have paid out undisclosed sums of money — believed to be in the millions — to settle other claims related to mishandling of sexual abuse. Both the convention and its chief administrative entity remain defendants in about two dozen other court cases still pending.
Much of this came to light because of reporting by Downen, who previously wrote for the Houston Chronicle. There, he was the lead reporter on a 2019 series titled “Abuse of Faith,” a joint investigation by the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News.
For his part, Pressler has denied all wrongdoing even though at least seven other men have come forward with allegations of sexual misconduct by Pressler in incidents spanning four decades.