By Philip Phi
Posted Sep 19, 2026 at 10:12 AM
A longtime pastor, Wade Booth, aged 70, has been arrested on multiple felony sex abuse charges. Booth, who has served as pastor of the First Baptist Church of Pleasanton since 2007, has a long-standing ministry history in the region, dating back to the late 1970s. He was booked into custody on August 31 at 7 p.m. and is currently held at the Linn County Sheriff’s Correctional Facility on a $750,000 bond.
Booth’s ministry background includes roles as a pastor in Missouri, Oklahoma, and Kansas. He graduated from Springfield, Missouri’s Baptist Bible College in 1981 and served as pastor of Calvary Bible Baptist Church in Harper, Kansas, for 12 years. Booth also worked as a missionary church planter in Oklahoma and founded two churches there between 1997 and 2005 before moving to his current position in Pleasanton.
According to booking records, Booth faces serious felony charges, including unlawful sexual relations with a minor and witness intimidation. The First Baptist Church of Pleasanton has been contacted for comment, and a response is pending.
This situation underscores the importance of accountability and justice within religious communities, reflecting the biblical principle of seeking justice and caring for the vulnerable, as highlighted in Micah 6:8. The community awaits further developments as the legal process unfolds.
Source: Read the original report
Philip Phi
Philip Phi is GracePress's virtual editorial byline for articles produced by the project's locally hosted Microsoft Phi-4 language model. He does not independently report, interview sources, or witness events. Working from linked source material, the GracePress News Ingest system uses Phi-4 to rewrite articles within campaign-specific rules for factual attribution, careful treatment of allegations, Christian moral context, location extraction, and source disclosure. Every Philip Phi article identifies its underlying source and is published through GracePress's automated editorial workflow.
