Assemblies of God Abuse Claims: What Lawsuits and Investigations Have Alleged

For decades, the Assemblies of God has been one of the most recognizable names in American Christianity. With more than 13,000 affiliated churches across the United States and a global membership in the tens of millions, the denomination occupies an enormous position of trust in communities large and small. That trust, lawsuits and investigations have alleged, was exploited — repeatedly, and across multiple generations.

Assemblies of God abuse claims have surfaced in courtrooms, criminal records, and newsrooms across the country. If you or someone you love attended an Assemblies of God church and experienced abuse, understanding what the documented record shows can be an important part of deciding your next steps. My firm has worked with survivors pursuing Assemblies of God sex abuse lawsuits in Arkansas and I know firsthand the specific challenges these cases present.

What follows is a factual account of what lawsuits, criminal proceedings, and major journalistic investigations have alleged — not a verdict, but a record.

The Scope of What Investigations Have Found

In October 2025, NBC News published a landmark investigative report — part of a series called “Pastors and Prey” — that documented approximately 50 years of sexual abuse allegations within the Assemblies of God denomination. Reporters identified nearly 200 ministers, church employees, and volunteer leaders who had been accused of sexually abusing more than 475 people, the majority of them children.

The investigation alleged that the pattern was not one of isolated incidents. Reports indicated that when abuse was discovered, church leaders in multiple cases handled it internally rather than reporting it to law enforcement. Accused individuals were sent to counseling, suspended briefly, or quietly moved to other congregations — where, in several documented instances, the abuse continued.

That structure is what separates these Assemblies of God abuse allegations from a simple story about bad individuals. Investigations have pointed to institutional responses — or the absence of them — as the mechanism that allowed harm to repeat.

The denomination’s General Secretary, Donna Barrett, responded to the NBC News findings, stating that the Assemblies of God had maintained a zero-tolerance policy for credentialed ministers who had sexually abused children. Critics pushed back on that framing, noting that under denominational policy, only a church’s lead pastor is required to hold ministerial credentials. Youth pastors, music ministers, and other staff in direct contact with children were not subject to the same oversight requirements. That gap, lawsuits have alleged, created openings for predators.

Arkansas: Allegations That Hit Close to Home

The NBC News investigation cited a specific incident in Arkansas that illustrates the broader pattern lawsuits and reports have described. A children’s pastor in Arkansas was caught filming girls in a church bathroom. According to the report, no one called the police. Church leadership suspended him briefly. He later went on to sexually assault more children.

That case is consistent with what Assemblies of God sexual abuse claims have alleged across multiple states: that internal discipline was treated as a substitute for mandatory reporting, and that protecting the institution took precedence over protecting children.

More recently, Assemblies of God church abuse lawsuits have directly named Arkansas churches and denominational bodies. On January 30, 2026, a lawsuit was filed in Pulaski County Circuit Court against Refuge Church of the Assemblies of God in Jonesboro — formerly known as Jonesboro First Assembly of God. The lawsuit alleged that the General Council of the Assemblies of God, the Arkansas District Council of the Assemblies of God, Refuge Church leadership, and senior pastor Mike Glover all knew that children’s pastor Tony Waller had sexually abused two sisters while they were children and took no meaningful action to stop it. Waller pleaded guilty to rape in 2016 and is serving a life sentence in prison.

According to allegations in the complaint, the cover-up did not happen in the shadows. Around 2004, the plaintiffs discovered a hidden camera Waller had installed in a bathroom on the church campus. They reported it directly to Mike Glover, who escalated the matter to the church board, the District Council, and the General Council. The response, the complaint alleges, was to suspend Waller for two to four weeks for “spiritual restoration,” remove the visible camera, and then return him to his full role running the homeschool program — with no report made to law enforcement or the Arkansas Child Abuse Hotline as required by state law. The complaint further alleges that a second camera Waller had installed in the bathroom ceiling was never removed, and that he continued abusing children for approximately another decade before victims went directly to police.

When we filed this lawsuit, we made clear that when survivors come forward and their reports are handled internally rather than reported as required by law, the damage doesn’t end — it multiplies.

A fuller picture of what the institution knew, and when, is detailed in the documented history of reporting failures within the Assemblies of God.

Specific Cases the Record Reflects

Beyond Arkansas, the documented record of Assemblies of God sexual abuse lawsuits spans multiple states and multiple decades. Several cases illustrate how allegations have described the same institutional failure repeating in different places.

Illinois: A preacher was accused of sexually abusing children over multiple years. Church leaders, reports indicate, sent him to therapy rather than contacting law enforcement. He was allowed to continue in ministry.

California: A worship minister named Timothy Scarr pleaded guilty in 1985 to molesting two boys. After serving his sentence, he returned to his position at the church and sexually abused two more boys, according to investigative reporting. In a legal filing related to the case, an attorney wrote that forgiveness was framed as a theological obligation, not an institutional failure.

Kentucky and Illinois: Lawsuits tied to a man named Lehmann alleged that he sexually abused three young relatives over several years, with the abuse beginning when each girl was approximately six years old. His adult son, who also served as an Assemblies of God pastor, later reported his father to police after reportedly discovering that the denomination had covered up his father’s earlier offenses. Lehmann pleaded guilty to child rape in 2018 and received a suspended prison sentence. Survivors subsequently sued the Assemblies of God national office and its Illinois and Kentucky district councils. Those cases settled in 2022.

Oklahoma: Joe Campbell, a former Assemblies of God minister, was arrested in December 2025 on child sexual abuse charges. Reports indicate that five women alleged Campbell had sexually abused them as children in the 1970s and 1980s when he was an active minister. Multiple survivors stated they had reported Campbell’s behavior to pastors, law enforcement, and child welfare officials at the time — only to watch him continue preaching. One survivor recounted traveling to Springfield, Missouri, at age 15 to testify before a panel of Assemblies of God officials. Campbell continued in ministry until the denomination finally removed him in 1989.

Texas: In August 2025, the Assemblies of God faced public scrutiny following revelations about Daniel Savala, a convicted sex offender who had abused boys and young men connected to the denomination’s Chi Alpha college ministry. At least ten victims came forward in lawsuits, sworn statements, and criminal filings. Reports indicated that Assemblies of God officials had been warned about Savala’s behavior as early as 2013 but failed to cut ties with him, giving him continued access to students.

The Jonesboro case is examined in closer detail in a separate piece covering the history of the Refuge Church lawsuit and what preceded it.

The Royal Rangers: Allegations Within a Denominational Youth Program

One of the most extensively documented areas of Assemblies of God abuse claims involves the Royal Rangers, the denomination’s Pentecostal counterpart to the Boy Scouts. In December 2025, a report brought renewed attention to decades of alleged abuse within the program.

According to reporting and lawsuits, at least 29 Royal Rangers leaders have been accused of sexually abusing boys in their care. Those men were reportedly accused of abusing at least 83 boys through the Rangers program, with dozens more alleged victims identified outside the ministry context.

Assemblies of God sexual abuse lawsuits tied to the Royal Rangers have alleged that the program’s structure created significant institutional vulnerabilities. No efforts were made to track accused leaders or prevent them from moving between congregations. A man credibly accused of abuse at one church could transfer to another and continue working with children with no record following him.

Over the past four years alone, survivors have filed at least 17 lawsuits related to Royal Rangers and Assemblies of God abuse, alleging both direct harm and institutional negligence. In 2021, the Assemblies of God agreed to settle a Royal Rangers abuse lawsuit in Oregon, avoiding what would have been the first case to put the denomination before a jury as a defendant in a sexual abuse matter.

One survivor, Travis Reger, described his experience to attorneys and reporters with a statement that has been cited across multiple legal filings: “The church never did anything.”

The broader structural argument — that the denomination’s governance model created conditions for abuse to persist — is central to how Tony Waller’s guilty plea connects to the civil lawsuit that followed.

What Lawsuits Have Alleged About Institutional Failures

Assemblies of God abuse investigations have pointed to several recurring institutional failures that lawsuits have translated into specific legal claims. These are not characterizations — they are allegations that have appeared in filed court documents, many of which have either settled or are proceeding through litigation.

Among the failures most commonly alleged:

Failure to report. Arkansas and most states require certain adults — including clergy in some circumstances — to report known or suspected child abuse to law enforcement. Lawsuits have alleged that Assemblies of God leaders consistently chose internal discipline over mandatory reporting, allowing abusers to avoid criminal accountability and continue harming children.

Failure to warn. When accused leaders were removed from one congregation, lawsuits allege that the denomination and its district councils did not warn receiving churches or communities. In multiple cases, an accused minister was allowed to take a position at a new church with no disclosure of prior allegations.

Negligent supervision. Civil lawsuits have alleged that churches failed to implement basic safeguards — background checks, reporting protocols, supervision requirements — that could have identified risks or created accountability structures.

Cover-up allegations. A number of lawsuits and criminal records include allegations that church leaders actively discouraged victims from coming forward, pressured them to forgive their abusers privately, or characterized reporting to authorities as a betrayal of Christian community.

The denomination has pushed back on the most sweeping characterizations. After the NBC News investigation was published, denomination leaders stated that the Assemblies of God maintained background check requirements for credentialed ministers and had policies in place barring known abusers from returning to ministry. Critics, including pastors within the denomination, argued that those policies contained structural gaps that left children exposed — particularly when the abuser held a position that didn’t require ministerial credentials.

The Denomination’s Response and the Calls for Reform

In the months following the NBC News investigation, the Assemblies of God faced calls for reform from within and outside its ranks. Denomination senior leader Doug Clay addressed thousands of pastors at a denominational meeting in Orlando, calling sexual abuse a “scar on people’s lives” and promising structural reviews and stronger protective policies.

For many survivors, those statements did not go far enough. The denomination’s refusal to publicly release the results of its internal investigation — citing privacy concerns — was cited by victims as evidence that transparency remained subordinate to institutional protection.

Several Assemblies of God pastors broke publicly with the denomination’s response. Anthony Scoma, a San Francisco-based Assemblies pastor, called for “churchwide, denominationalwide repentance,” stating that policy changes alone could not fix a culture that had prioritized protecting abusers over protecting children.

Jen Doyle, who said she was groomed and sexually abused at age 13 by a music leader in her church, became one of the more publicly visible advocates for structural change. Along with other survivors, she called for an independent review of how the denomination had handled historical abuse reports, a centralized warning system for accused ministers, and mandatory protective protocols in every congregation.

Whether those reforms materialize in a meaningful way remains an open question. What is not in question is that survivors have options. Civil law operates independently of what a denomination chooses to disclose or reform.

Can Survivors Sue Assemblies of God Churches?

The answer, in most cases, is yes — and in Arkansas, recent legal changes have made the path to civil accountability more accessible than it has been in decades.

Assemblies of God church abuse lawsuits are civil actions, meaning they operate separately from criminal prosecutions. A survivor can pursue a civil claim regardless of whether criminal charges were ever filed — or whether the abuser is still alive.

In Arkansas, the legal landscape for childhood sexual abuse claims has shifted significantly. The state’s Justice for Vulnerable Victims of Sexual Abuse Act removed the statute of limitations for many survivors who were minors at the time of the abuse, meaning there is no deadline preventing someone born on or after July 28, 2000 from filing a civil lawsuit. Older survivors may also have options depending on whether their claims were previously barred and whether a revival window applies to their situation.

Understanding what these cases involve structurally — including how the denomination’s leadership layers create both accountability and complexity — is covered in depth in an analysis of how the Assemblies of God youth ministry structure put children at risk.

What This Means for Survivors and Families

Reading through this record is not easy. For survivors who attended Assemblies of God churches as children — or whose children were members of youth programs, Royal Rangers chapters, or affiliated ministries — the pattern of alleged failures can bring up anger, grief, and complicated feelings about institutions that were supposed to be places of safety.

Those responses are valid. And the documented record that lawsuits and investigations have assembled over decades suggests that individual survivors were not alone, were not imagining things, and were not at fault.

If you or someone you love was sexually abused in an Assemblies of God church or affiliated ministry — in Arkansas or elsewhere — a confidential consultation with a sex abuse attorney costs you nothing and gives you information. Civil law does not require a criminal conviction. It does not require you to have reported the abuse at the time. It does not require you to remember everything perfectly.

What it requires is a survivor willing to step forward.

My firm is based in Little Rock, Arkansas. We represent survivors of institutional sexual abuse and have specific experience with Assemblies of God abuse claims. Reach out for a free, confidential consultation to understand your legal rights and what options may still be available to you.