Former reality TV star Joseph Duggar is facing a child molestation charge in Florida, almost five years after his brother Josh, who also starred in the TLC show 19 Kids and Counting, was convicted of downloading child sexual abuse images.
Joseph Duggar, 31, was arrested in Arkansas, where he lives, and was awaiting extradition to Florida on Thursday. Duggar is charged with lewd and lascivious behavior toward a child under 12 years old, according to an arrest affidavit from the Bay county sheriff’s office in Panama City, Florida.
Police officers in Tontitown, Arkansas, on Wednesday contacted deputies in Bay county, saying they had interviewed a 14-year-old girl who told them that Duggar had molested her several times during a family trip to Panama City Beach when she was aged nine, according to the affidavit.
The girl’s father confronted Duggar about the abuse this week and the father said Duggar admitted to it. Police officers in Tontitown had the father call Duggar with a detective on the line, and he again admitted to the actions, the arrest affidavit said.
There was no online court docket in Florida for Duggar so it wasn’t known if he had an attorney. Nobody responded immediately to an inquiry made on the Duggar family media request website.
Police in Tontitown didn’t respond to inquiries made by email and phone.
TLC’s 19 Kids and Counting followed the lives of devout Baptists Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar and their 19 children, all of whose names began with the letter J.
TLC canceled the show in 2015 following allegations that Josh Duggar had molested four of his sisters and a babysitter years earlier. Josh Duggar’s parents said he had confessed to the fondling and apologized.
He was sentenced in 2022 to about 12 and a half years in prison on one count each of receiving and possessing images portraying child sexual abuse.
19 kids and counting the ones arrested for child molestation
Does anyone remember the Duggars? That wierd, loony family with the TV show something about 19 kids? And they quit having kids because on #20 the wife and mother suffered an almost fatal uterine prolapse?
Remember how one of their sons was convicted five years ago of child molestation?
Well — looks like it runs in the family — Joseph Duggar and his wife Kendra have been charged in Arkansas and Florida with several counts involving mistreatment and abuse of children. Kendra Duggar is now facing criminal charges alongside her husband, Joseph Duggar, after Arkansas police announced additional counts in the ongoing investigation.
According to a Friday, March 20, press release from the Tontitown Police Department, both Joseph, 31, and Kendra, 27, are now facing four counts of endangering the welfare of a minor in the second degree, and four counts of false imprisonment in the second degree.
Authorities said arrest warrants have been issued and served for the misdemeanor offenses through District Court. The police department noted that the investigation remains “active and ongoing,” adding that Arkansas law limits the amount of information that can be publicly released in cases involving minors and other sensitive circumstances.
The latest filing brings four additional counts of each charge against the former 19 Kids and Counting star, on top of the two previously filed for which he was already facing, including lewd and lascivious molestation of a victim less than 12 years old, and lewd and lascivious behavior conducted by a person 18 years or older.
Kendra has been newly charged in the case.