In Touch Weekly, the gossip magazine that broke the story about sexual molestation allegations in the home of Jim Bob Duggar and Michelle Duggar, stars of the “19 Kids and Counting” reality show and proponents of the theory that gay people are risks to molest children, has obtained another police report on the allegations.
This report — from the Washington County sheriff’s office — has been edited to remove names of the youth accused of molesting children and the names of the victims. It provides another narrative of the same encounter between Duggars and police contained in a Springdale police report in 2006 that had been released earlier. But it’s clearer as to events and the timeline.
As In Touch laid it out:
Josh Duggar told his father Jim Bob Duggar on three separate occasions about contact with girls in their home over a period of a year between March 2002 and March 2003. Jim Bob Duggar didn’t report any of this to a law officer for 16 months and In Touch says no counseling was sought for victims or perpetrator. Seven acts are mentioned. One of them concerns contact between a boy then 15 and a five-year-old girl.
Fox News’ Megyn Kelly is to interview Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar tonight about the story. She’s expressed outrage that reports have been made public. She said she has no intention of cross-examining the Duggars about their actions. The Duggars have led battles to maintain legal discrimination against gay people in Arkansas. In the successful campaign to overturn a Fayetteville civil rights ordinance, Michelle Duggar recorded a message for robocalls that raised the specter of children being molested by transgender people in women’s bathrooms.
In Touch asserts, quoting unnamed legal authorities, that the Duggars could have been prosecuted before the statute of limitations expired for failing to report contact that began in 2002. They eventually sought out a friend at the State Police, who said he gave a stern talk to Josh Duggar but took no official action as the law required, and they also sent their son to a center in Little Rock for “treatment.”
The 2006 review, years after the fact, was triggered by a complaint to the Oprah show shortly before a scheduled Duggar family appearance. Oprah employees promptly reported it to the child abuse hotline and an investigation began. It was decided then that that the statute of limitations had expired. Since then, Juvenile Judge Stacey Zimmerman has ordered the Springdale report destroyed. No word yet if anything similar will be attempted with the latest report.
