Richard Rossi

Richard Rossi is an American filmmaker, actor, writer, talk radio host, musician, and former evangelical minister.

Among Rossi's projects are the film Canaan Land which contained five songs by Rossi that made the Oscars consideration song list (Canaan Land was also on the list of 366 films eligible for a Best Picture Oscar in 2021), Baseball's Last Hero: 21 Clemente Stories, a biopic on the life of Roberto Clemente and two films about evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson.

In 1986, Rossi started First Love, a charismatic church.

He rented movie theaters and showed films as an evangelistic outreach.

Dramatic faith healings allegedly occurred.

In 1988, Rossi tried and failed to change both the name of the Church of the Three Rivers and its affiliation.

He then joined the Assemblies of God the next year and led the Cranberry church, but left in 1991, saying that his ministry was too radical for the Assemblies; church officials said he left owing several thousand dollars for the church building.

In September 1991, Rossi began broadcasting his nightly radio show Rich Rossi Live on Pittsburgh's WPIT-FM.

The program created controversy when Rossi called other evangelical churches "whores" who sell out the gospel for money.

Rossi filmed the healings and co-produced a documentary on faith healing and exorcism in 1992 entitled Quest for Truth.

The program first aired during the fall 1993 season on WPGH-TV 53 and WPTT-TV 22.

Rossi appeared on the Jerry Springer Show in 1994 to discuss faith healing, exorcism, and ESP.

On June 24, 1994, Rossi's wife, Sherrie Lynn, was found near death in a coma on the side of a Pennsylvania road.

She had a crushed skull and was left covered in blood; her injuries were so severe that she needed to wear a helmet.

Her rescuers thought she had been in a traffic accident, and called for an ambulance.

Ninety minutes later, at 8:05 pm, Richard Rossi called police, and claimed that men killed his wife and shot at him twice.

But when police came to interview him, his story changed, first claiming that a man that looked like him got into the passenger side of the car, then that the man who looked like him attacked from the driver's side.

Rossi had a cellular phone available, but said he pursued the assailant instead of dialing for help because he was a "good runner."

Rossi also changed his story on where the assailants approached from, first saying they were in a white car, then that they "came out of the woods out of nowhere."

Police testified that Rossi told them a "satanic cult" was trying to frame him; Rossi denies this.

Rossi was wearing only a pair of tan shorts when police interviewed him; Rossi claimed that he lost his shirt running through the woods, but did not explain why he was barefoot.

Several witnesses reported seeing a man with long hair near the Rossi's cars, and State Police reports suggested the presence of two other cars, one blue and one white.

In October 1994, Sherrie testified her husband was "not to blame"; a state court judge refused her request to void the order of protection.

(Press accounts claimed that Ms. Rossi stated that her attacker might have been a demon in human form, but the Rossis deny she said this.)

Sherrie Rossi testified in the trial that her attacker was a different man with brown eyes and that Rossi's eyes are blue.

She said her earlier testimony against Rossi was coerced by police when she was still recovering and did not have a complete recollection, and that her second testimony exonerating her husband came from "flashbacks" and a "fuller complete recollection" of what occurred.

A defender of Rossi corroborated Sherrie Rossi's mystery attacker, testifying a passing motorist saw a bearded man matching Sherrie Rossi's description wearing jeans.

In 1995 Rossi went on trial for the attempted murder of his wife.

She recanted her original identification of Rossi as her attacker and espoused his innocence.

The case ended in a mistrial and was front-page news in Rossi's adopted hometown of Pittsburgh and was widely covered as something of a cause célèbre by syndicated television news programs.

Rossi eventually was acquitted of attempted murder but pleaded no contest to an aggravated assault though he and his wife maintained his innocence.

Rossi's father was a professional jazz guitarist in West View, Pennsylvania; the son followed in his father's footsteps, playing the guitar on stage at age 7.

As a child, Rossi was fascinated with Pittsburgh-based faith healer Kathryn Kuhlman.

After one of his father's hospitalizations for manic depression, Rossi landed in a surrogate family led by an evangelist who immersed him in Pentecostal preaching and outreach.

After a drug overdose,

Rossi became a born-again Christian and toured as a rock and roll preacher, usually in tandem with songwriting partner Johnny Walker, playing gospel rock.

Rossi and his songwriting partner Walker were featured on The 700 Club.

Rossi moved to Lynchburg, Virginia at age 18 to study at Liberty University, where he earned a bachelor's and master's degree in biblical studies.

His second church, created informally with ministry partner Jack Sims, was called "Matthew's Party," the name taken from the biblical story about Jesus eating with tax collectors and sinners at the home of Matthew, the gospel writer.

The healing services, called "Healing Clinics," grew from 200 to 2000.