Disturbing Allegations Emerge As Josh Duggar's Child Porn Trial Gets Underway
*Hat Tip: Kevin D.
Josh Duggar’s trial on child pornography charges kicked off Wednesday after a judge ruled that the jurors can hear evidence the former reality TV star admitted to molesting four girls nearly 20 years ago.
The evidence in question was included in testimony from a Duggar family friend during a pre-trial hearing on Monday.
The woman testified that the former “19 Kids and Counting” star told her in 2003 that he molested four girls.
The child molester’s defense team argued that he was never charged over the allegations and that they are irrelevant to his current case.
US District Judge Timothy Brooks disagreed.
“The child pornography victims in this case are approximately the same ages as the victims of defendant’s hands-on child-molestation offenses,” Brooks wrote in the ruling.
“Accordingly, the prior act evidence is probative of defendant’s sexual interest in underage children and his propensity for exploiting young girls.”
Duggar, 33, was charged in April with two counts of downloading and possessing child pornography.
He is accused of downloading child porn files onto a computer at his now-shuttered used car dealership over the course of three days in May 2019.
In May, a federal agent testified that at least 65 images of child porn were on the embattled TV star’s computer, including a two-minute video that showed a man sexually abusing two girls aged between 5 and 10 years old.
Duggar has pleaded not guilty and has maintained his innocence.
During opening statements, Duggar’s attorney, Justin Gilfand, argued that someone else downloaded or placed the images depicting the sexual abuse of children on his computer.
“If you like a mystery, then this is the case for you,” Gilfand told jurors, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported.
“This is a classic, old fashioned whodunit.”
But federal prosecutors detailed logs showing the activity on Duggar’s computer that alternated between sending personal messages, downloading child porn and saving pictures of notes, the newspaper reported.
Source: https://nypost.com/2021/12/01/josh-duggars-child-porn-trial-begins-after-judge-allows-past-evidence