A pastor’s daughter thought she had escaped a childhood of sexual abuse by moving away and getting married only to see her father barge into her home and sodomize her weeks after she had a baby.
Bertheophilus ‘Judge’ Bailey, a respected minister at St Andrew’s Christian Church in Tulsa, began abusing Harmony Oates when she was in the sixth grade, court documents claim.
He told his daughter that he was her ‘boyfriend’ and that the little girl would unleash a ‘total catastrophe for the entire kingdom of God’ if she ever revealed what he was doing to her.
But he was arrested on Wednesday and charged with rape, child sexual abuse, incest, forcible sodomy and robbery, after the 22-year-old decided he had spent too much time “in the shadows.”
“It left me broken, shattered, a shell of the person I could have been,” she wrote on Facebook. “And yet, I refuse to let him define me.”
Harmony Oates in church with Pastor Bertheophilus ‘Judge’ Bailey on Father’s Day 2022
Bailey, 45, was arrested Wednesday and is being held on $500,000 bail on charges of rape, child sexual abuse, incest, forcible sodomy and robbery.
Bailey, 45, had had felony charges of lewd sexual abuse against him dropped when he turned his attention to his daughter in 2012.
And in 2013 he admitted to a separate charge of child abuse by injury against another of his children.
“At first he was praying for me, but he was touching me a lot while he was praying,” Oates said. kjrh.com.
‘I knew how to set a boundary, but when he’s your father and when he’s a pastor and when he has this authority and he has a history, it’s like you say no, but what does your no mean?’
The assaults escalated and Bailey began raping his daughter after she turned 16 as she struggled to reconcile the public image of a loving father with the man who abused her.
“The thing is, when I was a little girl I separated my father from who he was, I had to do it, that’s the only way I survived,” she said.
“I would call him my best friend just to hide the reality of what I was experiencing.”
And she claims her father refused to let her go even after she escaped the family home.
“In 2021, after she moved out, got married, and had a baby, the defendant entered her residence without warning, pushed her to the floor, and forcibly orally sodomized her,” the probable cause affidavit reads. .
“After that incident, the defendant began going to (her) residence and looking in her windows.”
Oates said her father began abusing her when she was a sixth-grader.
She claims that he warned her that he would unleash a “total catastrophe for the entire kingdom of God” if she ever revealed what he was doing to her.
The University of Oklahoma graduate describes himself as a “community servant” and “men’s recovery counselor” on his LinkedIn profile.
He worked as senior pastor at St Andrew’s in North Tulsa in 2018.
Oates began to confide first in her husband, then an older brother, and finally her mother Aricca before confronting Bailey.
In a series of text messages included in the affidavit, the pastor admitted his guilt and told his accusers, “I am an adulterer.” I am a child molester. I’m a rapist.’
In one he admitted to having watched incest porn videos and added that “the seeds of sin grow.”
He allegedly told them that he felt justified in having sex with his daughter because “that’s what people do.”
Bailey also allegedly admitted to abusing his daughter in conversations with her therapist and sent his wife an email in which the counselor warned her that she had a legal duty to report the abuse to police.
“In the email chain, the defendant tells the therapist that he understands his legal duty to report child abuse, but that he felt misled and thought it was safe to disclose during therapy,” the affidavit states.
Bailey, who describes himself as a “community servant” and a “men’s recovery counselor” on his LinkedIn profile, graduated from the University of Oklahoma and has been senior pastor at St Andrew’s since 2018.
Her daughter went to the police in August 2023 and on September 17 announced that she was willing to press charges.
“For too long I suffered in silence, afraid of the repercussions of speaking out against someone with so much influence and power,” she wrote on Facebook.
‘The damage it has caused is immeasurable. “It has poisoned my relationships, it poisoned my mind,” he added.
‘It has filled me with doubts, fears, a feeling of uselessness that I struggle to overcome.
‘As a victim of sexual and mental abuse at the hands of Pastor Bailey for over a decade, I feel compelled to warn others about his predatory behavior.
“Despite his status as a respected member of the community, it is essential to shed light on his actions to prevent further harm to unsuspecting people.”
The next day, the rest of his family issued a statement offering him their full support.
“You are a strong, intelligent and talented young woman,” they wrote.
“No one should ever have their trust and safety violated in such a horrible way, especially by their own father.
“We are all deeply sorry that this happened to you.”
Oates and her mother Arrica went to police after confronting Bailey about her abuse.
Oates originally confided in her husband Malachi with whom she has a young daughter.
“Coming out of the darkness makes you a survivor,” he told kjrh.com. ‘That’s what I would say. “It feels like I’m not in the shadows anymore.”
Bailey resigned from St Andrew’s on September 21 and has been held in the Tulsa County Jail on $500,000 bail since his arrest on Wednesday.
Since then, another alleged victim of Bailey’s has come forward as Oates prepares to face his father in court.
“Think about a 13-year-old girl confused about who her true love is because her father tells her, ‘I’m your boyfriend,'” she said.
‘I am learning to trust God more and I know that he has me and all the other victims.
‘He has been guiding me through this entire journey and I know he will come to help me like a father, even though my father didn’t.
‘Coming out of the darkness makes you a survivor. That’s what I would say.
“It feels like I’m not in the shadows anymore.”
