What to Know
It’s been eight months since Joseph Duggar‘s shocking arrest on child molestation charges, but his fate will remain hanging in the balance even longer than originally anticipated. This week, Joseph’s case was delayed yet again. Now, it looks like he won’t be seeing the inside of the courtroom until March at the earliest.
Considering this is just the pretrial hearing that has been delayed, there’s no telling when an actual trial would finally be able to begin, and critics are heated that things are taking so long.
Joseph’s pretrial hearing was delayed until next year.
On Tuesday, an Arkansas local ABC affiliate reported that even though Joseph was scheduled to have a pretrial hearing in Florida that day, it has once again been pushed back — this time, to March 9, 2027.
In September, Joseph’s lawyer told the judge that he needed more time to talk to witnesses, so it looks like that time he requested has been granted. A lot of time, actually; this is a delay of four months, so the hearing will take place just about a year after Joseph was arrested in the first place.
Joseph is currently facing charges of lewd and lascivious molestation of a victim younger than 12 and lewd and lascivious conduct by a person 18 or older after a 14 year old girl reported that an incident took place during a family beach trip when she was 9 years old. She has accused Joseph of asking her to sit on his lap before allegedly touching her under her underwear and on her thighs.
Some Duggar critics are frustrated that it’s taking so long for Joseph’s case to go to trial.
Understandably, Duggar critics are becoming angry that it’s taking so long for Joseph to be brought to justice, voicing their opinions on Reddit.
“Well that sucks. The sooner this pedo is in prison where he belongs, the better. Monsters like him do not deserve bail,” one commenter wrote.
Another said, “The longer this takes to play out, the more pain that poor girl has to go through. His lawyers know that and are going to try to stretch this out as long as possible to up the chances of her not being able to handle any of this at a certain point.”
However, the delay might be a good thing.
As one Reddit user pointed out, “While frustrating it’s good they’re taking their time. I also have to remember that the victim told her dad, he told authorities, and Joseph was arrested within like 48 hours of anyone in charge knowing anything (as it should be!!!!); but this wasn’t a situation where investigators had already built a solid case against him before actually arresting him and making it public knowledge, so it will take a bit longer.”
Ultimately, Joseph could be facing more than 10 years behind bars (much like his older brother, Josh Duggar), so it makes sense that such a serious case would be moving so slowly.
It seems like we’ll have to wait a while before there are any new updates on what Joseph’s future will be like, but so far, it’s not looking good.
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