Joseph Duggar and his wife, Kendra Duggar, have withdrawn their not guilty pleas after being charged in a child endangerment case.
Us can confirm the couple were permitted to skip a Monday, August 10, court hearing in Arkansas after both parties submitted a plea by order to the court.
The legal move allows both Joseph, 31, and Kendra, 27, to enter guilty or no contest pleas to those charges, a spokesperson for the Washington County District Court told People.
Back in March, Joseph and Kendra — who have been married since September 2017 and share four children — were charged with endangering the welfare of a minor and four counts of second-degree false imprisonment. Kendra pleaded not guilty and was released on a $1,470 bond shortly after her arrest. She was initially required to avoid contact with her alleged victims, but in April, a judge signed off on her lawyer’s request to have the order lifted.
Joseph, for his part, pleaded not guilty to the child endangerment charges in April. The following month, he requested that a no-contact order be lifted so he could see his children. A judge ultimately denied his request for unsupervised contact with his kids, ruling that he could have supervised contact with them instead.
Joseph was previously arrested in Arkansas on March 18 for a separate case. He was charged with lewd and lascivious behavior involving molestation of a victim less than 12 years old and lewd and lascivious behavior conducted by a person 18 years or older. After being extradited to Florida, he pleaded not guilty and requested a jury trial. Later that month, he was released on a $600,000 bond and returned to Arkansas.
The molestation charges stemmed from a 14-year-old accusing Duggar of touching her inappropriately multiple times during a 2020 vacation to Florida when she was 9 years old. She claimed that Duggar “apologized for his actions,” after which the alleged abuse stopped.
Amid Joseph’s ongoing legal battle, his alleged victim in the child molestation case faced the difficult circumstances with bravery.
“It took a lot for her to come forward, but she is not scared,” a source exclusively told Us Weekly in April. “She is strong. She doesn’t want to hide.”
The insider also addressed why the alleged victim waited to come forward about Joseph’s alleged behavior.
“When [the alleged sexual assault] happened, Joseph was on vacation with Kendra and her family,” the source claimed. “No other Duggar [family members] were there. … As years passed, [the alleged victim] understood more and got the courage to tell her family. Just like the police report says, when she told her family, they acted on it.”
Joseph’s lawyer Al Sauline told Us in a statement at the time, “Mr. Duggar maintains the same presumption of innocence as any individual as guaranteed under our United State Constitution. It remains our No. 1 goal to ensure Mr. Duggar is treated fairly, notwithstanding his celebrity status.”
If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673). If you or someone you know is experiencing child abuse, call or text Child Help Hotline at 1-800-422-4453.
