FAYETTEVILLE — A federal judge will allow Joshua James Duggar to be released from custody on a laundry list of conditions while he awaits trial on child pornography charges.
Duggar, 33, of Springdale, appeared before U.S. Magistrate Judge Erin Wiedemann on Friday and pleaded not guilty to one charge of receipt of child pornography and one charge of possession of child pornography. Judge Christy Comstock presided over Wednesday’s detention hearing.
Duggar, best known for being a part of his family’s cable television reality show, is accused of using the internet in May 2019 to download and possess the material, some of which depicts the sexual abuse of children younger than 12, according to court documents.
Comstock ruled Duggar can be released from jail Thursday. He is ordered confined to home detention at the residence of Lacount and Maria Reber, friends of the Duggar family who agreed to serve as third party custodians and monitor him. The Rebers assured Comstock they will make sure Duggar is in compliance with the terms of his release.
Duggar will be on electronic monitoring and confined to the Reber home with limited exceptions, such as going to work and church, which have to be pre-approved by federal probation officials. He’ll have to turn in his passport and travel will be restricted to Washington, Benton and Madison counties.
Duggar will be allowed to have unlimited contact with his own children as long as their mother is there but not with any other children, including nieces and nephews. Duggar and his wife, Anna, announced recently on social media she’s pregnant with their seventh child.
He is to have no access to any device than can access the Internet, no access to pornography of any kind and any telephone he is allowed to use for business must be approved by probation officers.
Duggar must sign a surety bond that he will abide by the terms of his release, show up to court and have no legal violations. Any federal law violation while he is on release is punishable by an additional one to 10 years imprisonment.
“If you can’t comply with any of them, then you’re going to stay right where you are,” Comstock told Duggar, who attended the hearing via Zoom from the Washington County jail.
Comstock said she would not allow Duggar to be released to his home, his parents home or his grandparents home because children are often there.
“I cannot in good faith send you home,” Comstock said.
Lawyers for Duggar argued Duggar should be released.
“The law presumes Duggar innocent and Duggar’s conduct for the 17 months that have transpired since the government executed a search of his former workplace and publicly acknowledged this investigation to the media underscores that Duggar is neither a danger to the community nor a risk of flight,” according to a motion filed prior to the detention hearing.
“Duggar was unwaveringly cooperative with federal law enforcement in November 2019, has remained fully compliant with the law, has continued to reside with his wife and raise his six children in this community, and self-surrendered as directed so as to obviate any need for an unnecessary law enforcement operation,” according to the motion.
Federal prosecutors opposed release, citing the nature and circumstances of the charges Duggar faces. They said many of the images he is charged with downloading showed children ranging from toddlers to 12 year olds.
Prosecutors said Duggar went to great lengths to hide what he was doing, including installing a program on his computer to bypass an accountability program that was supposed to tell his wife if he visited porn sites.
Prosecutors also pointed out Duggar admitted he inappropriately touched several of his sisters and other young girls when they were young and admitted in 2015 to having a pornography addiction.
If convicted, he faces up to 20 years of imprisonment and fines up to $250,000 on each count.
A pretrial hearing was set for July 1 and a July 6 court date was set before U.S. District Judge Timothy Brooks.
In was reported in November 2019 that federal authorities searched a used car dealership, Wholesale Motorcars, run by Duggar.
Duggar is the oldest of 19 children of Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar. The family were stars of the TLC cable channel show 19 Kids and Counting. The show was canceled and reruns of the show were pulled after In Touch magazine released a report May 21, 2015, that Josh Duggar had been the subject of a Springdale police investigation that he fondled young girls in the family home. TLC later canceled the show.