The following story contains descriptions of child sexual abuse.

A former Oklahoma Nazarene Church Superintendent and several pastors covered up years-long abuse by a former church board member and major donor, according to an affidavit obtained by The Roys Report (TRR).

Charles Sulivant, 91, of Macomb, Oklahoma, has been charged in Pottawatomie County District Court in Shawnee, Oklahoma with two counts of lewd molestation. Shawnee is located about 40 miles east of Oklahoma City.

Sulivant is accused of sexually assaulting the teens for several years at Shawnee First Church of the Nazarene, as reported by KFOR, an Oklahoma City news station. 

According to a probable cause affidavit, Oklahoma Nazarene District Superintendent Terry Rowland was told about Sulivant’s alleged abuse in 2016, as was Sulivant’s former pastor Johnny Stephens. Instead of reporting the alleged crime, Rowland and Stephens tried to discredit the victims and threatened at least two parents with the loss of their jobs, the affidavit states.

The victims told police “Sulivant is protected by the church (the Shawnee Church of the Nazarene), because he is wealthy and pays a lot of money to the church,” according to an arrest affidavit.

Court documents show Sulivant is accused of sexually abusing five females, some as young as eight years old, while serving as an elder and door greeter at the church. Some of the victims reported Sulivant would sit by the doors of the church, and have girls sit on his lap and kiss them on the cheek. He would also give the girls candy and “groom them,” the affidavit states.

The mother of one of the alleged victims went to the Shawnee Police in 2016, when her daughter was 16 years old, to report the 2008 crime, according to the arrest affidavit. But for an unknown reason charges were not filed until October 2024.

A message left for the Pottawatomie County Sheriff’s office about the whereabouts of the 2016 police report was not returned.

Sulivant, who attended the Shawnee Church of the Nazarene since 1972 and was on the church board for 10 years. He confessed to Shawnee Police that his then-pastor, Johnny Stephens, had called him into the office on multiple occasions and “told him to stop touching the little girls,” according to the arrest affidavit.

Stephens told investigators he had never seen Sulivant inappropriate to any of the girls, but he had “always heard about it,” court records show.

In an attempt to possibly defuse the situation, the pastor reportedly told one victim, “Charlie is old. I don’t know what this will do to his life. I don’t know how you want to pursue it, but I am going to go talk to your mom.” 

Court records show Stephens repeatedly talked to Sulivant saying, “Charlie, if you don’t stop this, you’re going to jail .”  The former pastor would admonish the elderly man saying, “You have to stop this” and “Charlie you have got to stay away from these young girls,” and “we are watching you.” 

Stephens has since retired from the church. Efforts to locate his current telephone number were unsuccessful.

Sulivant told investigators “He did those things to the girls to make himself feel good,” the affidavit states.  He also confirmed “that he was feeling the sexual drive towards the girls,” court records show.

When contacted by TRR on Monday, Sulivant had no comment and terminated the conversation.

A message left with Shawnee Church of the Nazarene was not returned and the church’s Facebook page has been removed.

According to the arrest warrant, the teens reported to investigators:

• A 9-year-old was lured to Sulivant’s truck in the church parking lot where he allegedly touched and kissed her and tried to “get under her clothes.” Sulivant told investigators he could not remember many details of the incident with the 9-year-old victim but that he does remember “she was an attractive girl,” the affidavit states.
• An 18-year-old was in the gym with her autistic relative. Sulivant came up behind her in the gym and started rubbing her hair and running his hand down her chest to the hem of her dress. The teen told investigators Sulivant tried to kiss her on the mouth, saying to her he “could really go for a girl like” her.
• Sulivant would allegedly pick up the victim when she was between the ages of 8 to 12-years-old and hold her with his arm between her legs, and his hand on her chest underneath her dress. He would also allegedly kiss her on the mouth and spin her around and call her his “little girlfriend.” Because of Sulivant’s actions, the child stopped wearing dresses to church.
• When a 15-year-old went to retrieve money from her mother’s purse that was on the ground, Sulivant allegedly walked up behind her. He then grabbed her by the hips and ”butt” with both hands and began pulling her into him and started rubbing his genitals against her butt. Then Sulivant reached up and allegedly grabbed her breasts and started squeezing them. When Sulivant started to reach inside of her shirt, the victim told investigators she elbowed him in the testicles and got away from him. 
• Sulivant allegedly came up behind an adult woman where he grabbed her, put his hands down her shirt, and tried to kiss her. 

Cover-Up

According to the probable cause affidavit, former Superintendent Terry Rowland was told of several incidents involving Sulivant. Instead of reporting Sulivant to the police as mandated by Oklahoma law, Rowland and Stephens set out to discredit the teens, the affidavit said.

They also reportedly threatened at least two parents of the victims with the loss of their jobs if they exposed Sulivant’s predatory behavior.

In an email from Rowland to one of the victim’s mothers, “Rowland informed her that if she pursued the issue against Charles Sulivant further then she would lose her minister’s license,” the affidavit states.

Another victim and her mother met Stephens to discuss an incident, the affidavit states. In a private meeting between the pastor and the teen, Stephens reportedly told her that she was a “bad kid” with a bad reputation in the church, and that nobody was going to believe her.

According to court records, Stephens said if people believed the victim and her mother, then Sulivant would have to leave the church and would be unable to tithe.  Then, the church would not be able to pay the mom’s salary, and she would lose her job, court records show. 

In another alleged threat, one of the victims disclosed the alleged abuse to Choctaw Church of the Nazarene youth pastor Drew Dinnel in 2016, the affidavit states. Initially, he reported the victim’s disclosures to Superintendent Rowland.

But Rowland told Dinnel not to report the alleged abuse, and to leave it up to the girls’ families to report it, the affidavit states. Dinnel also informed his lead pastor Mike Meaks, who allegedly said “they were not allowed to report the incident because they were staff members of the church.”

Dinnel told investigators he anonymously reported the alleged abuse to the Department of Human Services. Dinnel said the church tried to pass a board motion, stating that church staff could not report issues like this to DHS.

Rowland also threatened Dinnel’s job if he reported the abuse, court records show. Dinnel eventually left the Choctaw Church of the Nazarene before he could be fired. 

Stephens denied to authorities anyone’s job was threatened.

The retired pastor said he reached out to Rowland who reportedly told him, “that he needed to continue doing what he was doing to handle the situation,” referring to the abuse allegations.  

Stephens confirmed that neither he nor anyone else in his church mad any police reports or DHS referrals about what Sulivant was doing, the affidavit states.

However, Stephens once encouraged the victims saying, “those people should ‘sue’ somebody,” the affidavit states.  

A message left after hours with the Oklahoma District Church of the Nazarene was not returned.

A receptionist who identified herself as “Roberta” at the Church of the Nazarene headquarters in Lenexa, Kansas, said there was no one available for comment and said she “didn’t want to take a message.”

Stephens told KFOR he spoke with parents’ multiple times when told about the alleged crimes. But he added that he wasn’t going to excommunicate a Sulivant, and he was trying to “redeem” him.

“I tried my best to watch him,” and “I don’t doubt that it was wrong,” Stephens said in an interview with KFOR.

Sulivant is free on $40,000 bail, online records show.

Sheila Stogsdill is a freelance print journalist and digital reporter, primarily covering crime issues for KSN/KODE.