Former ’19 Kids and Counting’ star Joseph Duggar is arrested on a child molestation charge

Former reality TV star Joseph Duggar faces a child molestation charge in Florida, nearly five years after his brother Josh, who also starred on the TLC show “19 Kids and Counting,” was convicted of downloading child sex abuse images.

Joseph Duggar, 31, was arrested in Arkansas, where he lives, and was awaiting extradition to Florida on Thursday. Duggar was accused of lewd and lascivious conduct with a child under the age of 12, according to an arrest affidavit issued by the Bay County Sheriff’s Office in Panama City, Florida.

On Wednesday, police officers in Twentytown, Arkansas, 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 9, according to the affidavit.

The girl’s father confronted Duggar about the abuse this week, and the father said Duggar admitted to it. Twentytown police officers asked the father to call Duggar on the line and he again admitted to committing the acts, the affidavit said.

There was no online court docket in Florida for Duggar, so it was not known if he had an attorney. No one immediately responded to an inquiry made on the Duggar family’s media request website.

Police in Tontitown did not respond to inquiries made via 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 begin with the letter “J.”

TLC canceled the show in 2015 following allegations that Josh Duggar molested four of his sisters and a babysitter years earlier. Josh Duggar’s parents said he admitted to the groping and apologized.

He was sentenced in 2022 to nearly 12 1/2 years in prison for receiving and possessing images depicting child sexual abuse.

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Sarah Klein in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, contributed to this report.