Just three years ago, Aguilar was riding high, preaching to packed crowds at the Richmond Outreach Center and leading a house of worship with millions of dollars in assets, including about 10 nonprofit organizations — including a real estate foundation, cafe, thrift store, fitness center, child care center and clothing line, plus a tutoring company in Florida.

The ROC was one of the area’s biggest churches. It catered to former drug users and the alienated but also attracted the well-heeled and the middle class. On Friday, it officially changed its name to Celebration Church and Outreach Ministry and announced the hiring of a minister experienced at turning around troubled churches.

At its head was Aguilar, who possessed charm and a compelling personal narrative. A husband, father and shepherd of his flock, he drove expensive cars and motorcycles and lived in a church-owned parsonage on the James River worth more than $500,000.

He was the face of the ROC and an undisputed hero to the thousands who flocked each Saturday night to hear him preach the Gospel in a rock concert setting.

But soon after police in Texas publicly confirmed that he was being investigated, whispers about relationships with female parishioners and his storied background began to pop up. Local pastors and former congregants questioned whether Aguilar was the family man he portrayed himself as, and whether he was ex-street tough or just a kid from the suburbs.

On May 4, 2013, Aguilar told more than 1,000 parishioners — many in “My Pastor Rocks!” T-shirts — that all the talk was a plot meant to bring him and the ROC down.

“If this is the best the devil’s got, he ain’t got a chance,” the defiant pastor said to deafening cheers.

“We ain’t going to let up, give up or shut up. We’ve got a lot work to do in this city. We’ve got a lot of work to do in this nation,” he proclaimed.

Eighteen days later, Aguilar was arrested at his Richmond home by a U.S. Marshals Service fugitive task force for allegedly sexually assaulting the two girls. He was indicted on four counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child under 14, three counts of sexual assault of a child under 17, and five counts of indecency with a child.

The aggravated sexual assault charges are first-degree felonies that carry a maximum term of life in prison. The remaining charges are second-degree felonies with a maximum sentence of 20 years each.

He was sent to Texas and eventually released on $100,000 bond. He resigned June 5, 2013, a day after search warrants detailing the allegations were made public.

The ROC, according to tax records, gave him $76,000 in severance and allowed him to live in the parsonage until the end of the year.

That September, ROC leaders publicly announced that an internal investigation had uncovered numerous extramarital affairs.

The church’s website makes no mention of its founder, once the very public face of the multimedia operation. There are no videos or pictures, and recordings of his sermons have been wiped away.

There also are far fewer cars in the parking lots Wednesday and Saturday nights. One service last year had about half as many people as a year earlier.

Church leaders did not respond to a request for comment.

Aguilar, who has continued to live in Richmond, left Thursday for Texas to prepare for the trial, said one of his lawyers, David Carlson.

“If it was you, you would be [scared], too. If it were me, I would be, too. But I think he’s actually doing quite well,” Carlson said. “You have to prepare him for the worst and work as hard as you can and expect the best.”

According to the arrest warrants, Aguilar began sexually assaulting the 11-year-old girl and her 13-year-old sister in October 1996 while living in their parents’ home.

Police allege that Aguilar began staying at the home after the girls’ parents followed him from California to Fort Worth to join him at a church called New Beginnings.

The girls’ parents followed Aguilar “because he was their trusted spiritual leader,” which is how “he was able to move into their home and have access” to the victims, according to the warrants.

According to one of the warrants, Aguilar, then 26, first assaulted the younger of the two victims in October 1996 while lying in bed between the two girls. The abuse continued with inappropriate touching at the home and at church, the warrants said.

Police allege that in March 1997, shortly after moving to nearby Grapevine, Texas, Aguilar was having sex with the younger girl, then 12, in the family’s living room when he was caught by her parents. The parents, according to the arrest warrants, have given police a written statement saying that Aguilar admitted having sex with the girl.

The other warrant alleges that on Oct. 31, 1996, Aguilar entered into the older sister’s room and had sex with the then-13-year-old girl. He continued having sex with the girl until she was about 15, including in motels, a church van, a church bathroom and in public restrooms, police said.

Aguilar, according to the warrant, was asked to leave New Beginnings after a witness caught him kissing the girl.

Police also say a witness, Jason Pena, told them that when he was 16, he caught Aguilar buttoning his pants and putting on his belt while the older girl, “who was 13 or 14” at the time, watched from the end of the bed where she was covered with a blanket.

A couple married by Aguilar, Clement and Amanda Ray, told detectives that they overheard Aguilar asking for forgiveness and begging the girls’ parents not to “call the police for having sex with their daughters.”

Fort Worth Detective D.L. Nash, who swore out the warrants, said Aguilar had sex with the two girls for more than a year.

Aguilar has insisted since he was arrested that he is innocent of all the charges.

Carlson, the pastor’s attorney, said last week that defense lawyers are prepared to fight the charges and believe they have a strong case.

“There’s not any common ground on this thing to even be talking about a [plea agreement] ... not unless something changes when we get to Fort Worth,” he said.

“What’s on my plate here, in Richmond, there’s not going to be any plea. We’re just trying to be as prepared as we can to do the best we’re capable of as a defense team to represent this man.”

While Carlson would not discuss strategy, court filings show at least one of the arguments defense attorneys could use in the case and also expose one potentially huge liability.

In three filings asking a judge to dismiss the case, defense attorneys argue that the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services investigated Aguilar over the same claims in “1996 or 1997.”

The defense asked that the case be dismissed because the statute of limitations had passed, Aguilar did not get a speedy trial, and his right to due process was violated.

A spokeswoman for the Tarrant County district attorney’s office said last week that the motions were dismissed by the judge. Copies of prosecutors’ response to the defense filings were not available.

The family services agency, according to the defense motion, found the allegations unfounded. “However, records relating to this investigation have been purged per [the agency’s] regular destruction policies,” defense attorneys wrote in the filing.