A federal appeals court on Monday upheld Josh Duggar’s conviction for downloading child sexual abuse images, rejecting the former reality television star’s argument that a judge should have suppressed statements he made to investigators during the search that found the images.
A three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the appeal by Duggar, whose large family was the focus of TLC’s 19 Kids and Counting. Duggar was convicted in 2021 and is serving an over 12-year prison sentence.
Federal authorities investigated Duggar after Little Rock police detectives found child sexual abuse material was being shared by a computer traced to Duggar. Investigators testified that images depicting the sexual abuse of children, including toddlers, were downloaded in 2019 onto a computer at a car dealership Duggar owned.
Duggar’s lawyers argued that statements he made to investigators during the search of the dealership should not have been allowed at trial since his lawyer wasn’t present. Prosecutors said Duggar asked the agents, “What is this all about? Has somebody been downloading child pornography?” and that he declined to say whether he had looked at such material online, comments that were later used as evidence in the trial.
The appeals panel said that although Duggar was read his rights, the agents questioning him made it clear that he wasn’t in custody and was free to leave. The panel also noted that he wasn’t arrested at the end of his questioning.
“To the contrary, he ended the interview on his own and then left the dealership — hardly an option available to someone in custody,” the court ruled.
