TULSA - The former president of Oral Roberts University, who stepped down last year amid allegations he misspent school funds to live in luxury, will get a $223,600 salary from the school, under terms of a separation agreement announced Friday.
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Televangelist Richard Roberts, the son of school founder Oral Roberts, resigned last November.
He and his wife, Lindsay, were accused of spending money on shopping sprees, home improvements and a stable of horses for their daughters at a time when ORU was more than $50 million in debt. Both have repeatedly denied wrongdoing.
Under the terms of the agreement, ORU will pay Roberts his $223,600 annual salary for the remaining term of his appointment, which was to run through November 2009. Roberts was first elected president in 1993.
The school will deduct from the payment rent charged to Roberts while he lived in campus housing after he resigned and before he moved off campus.
Before the separation agreement became final, Roberts also had to pay back $23,179 in personal and travel expenses incurred before 2004 that had not been billed to or paid by Roberts, the university said.
"ORU appreciates the mission and spiritual heritage that we continue to maintain, which originated by the vision of Oral Roberts," Ralph Fagin, ORU's interim president, said in a statement Friday. "We value the years of investment Dr. Richard Roberts has made at ORU. We move forward with a heightened sense of duty and responsibility to the fruit of this great university — its students and alumni."
Billionaire Oklahoma City businessman Mart Green, who took the reins at ORU in January after donating $70 million and pledging to restore the public's trust in the small evangelical school, said the agreement means "another step forward for the university."
"Every milestone we pass helps us to focus more on what we do best: providing an excellent, whole-person education to our students," Green said Friday.
Former student Cornell Cross, who led the call on campus at the height of the scandal for greater transparency from school leaders and sued the school, claiming his degree had been devalued by the alleged wrongdoing, said he was glad to hear of the agreement.
"Ultimately, the separation is a good move between the university and Richard Roberts, and this will allow the student body to grow in the future with the finances of the school being guided correctly," he said.
Last month, ORU reached a settlement with two former professors who sued last year, claiming they were forced out after uncovering financial and ethical wrongdoing by Richard Roberts and his family.
The confidential settlement with Tim and Paulita Brooker came at the end of a court-ordered mediation session.
The Robertses still face a lawsuit brought by Trent Huddleston, a former senior accountant at ORU, who is suing for wrongful termination.
He alleges he was ordered to help "cook the books" by hiding improper and illegal financial wrongdoing from authorities and the public and directed against his will to falsely list thousands of dollars as expenses rather than assets to defraud the Internal Revenue Service.
Richard Roberts resigned days after Huddleston's suit was filed.
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