El Paso County church music teacher arrested on suspicion of sexual assault on 14-year-old
Apr. 13—A 58-year-old church music teacher and former school bus driver was arrested Thursday on suspicion of sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust after an investigation by the El Paso County Sheriff's Office — but this isn't the first time Robert Henry Gordon has faced accusations of sexual misconduct with young boys.
On Monday, the parents of a 14-year-old boy reported inappropriate text messages between their son and Gordon, who is employed as a music teacher at First United Pentecostal Church in the Security area south of Colorado Springs.
Gordon was arrested Thursday after an investigation by the special victim's unit and faces charges of sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust, sexual assault on a child, unlawful sexual contact and enticement of a child. He is being held without bond at the El Paso County jail.
However, Gordon has faced similar charges in El Paso County before.
Gordon was the subject of a yearlong investigation in El Paso County that began in August 2011, according to previous reporting by The Gazette. A male victim reported he and Gordon allegedly had a sexual relationship in 2001 when the boy was around 12 years old after he met Gordon at a church in Security-Widefield.
Gordon was charged with sexual assault on a child with pattern of sexual abuse, pattern of sexual assault on a child in a position of trust and six counts of sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust with a victim under the age of 15.
Of the eight total charges in that case, four were dismissed by the district attorney and Gordon was acquitted of the other four by a jury in 2014.
The 2001 arrest of Gordon, who was a bus driver in Security-Widefield District 3 at the time, coincided with a jury trial in a separate case where he faced charges of two counts of sexual assault on a child with force and sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust, court records show.
According to an arrest affidavit previously obtained by The Gazette, a 14-year-old boy accused Gordon of having sexual intercourse with him "quite a few" times while the boy slept over at Gordon's house in 1996. The teen alleged that the first incident happened when he was 12 or 13, the warrant said.
A jury found Gordon not guilty of the three charges in that case in February 2001.
In 1998, Gordon was convicted of harboring a runaway child, a class two misdemeanor, and was sentenced to a one-year unsupervised deferred sentence.
