Reading Time: 3 minutes
The court has a legal mandate to balance the rights and protections of victims with the lives of defendants who have not been convicted under the law.
Joseph Duggar is facing serious charges in Florida after allegedly molesting a 9-year-old girl.
Despite initially appearing repentant, he is now mounting a defense — and attempting to chip away at the court-ordered protection that his accuser received.
Joseph apparently owns multiple parcels of land near her family, and is asking the judge to let him to there to perform maintenance and upkeep.
He wants the court to let him get closer to her family’s home
People obtained a motion that Joseph’s attorney, Albert J Sauline III, filed in an effort to amend the protective order.
Part of the court’s order forbids Joseph from visiting multiple parcels of land that he owns.
This is not capricious — it is because the child, whom he reportedly twice confessed to molesting, live nearby.
Many protective orders ban an individual from getting within a certain proximity of a victim. However, there are sometimes exceptions.
Joseph seeks to modify the order — and claims that this will not impact the child or her family at all.
According to Joseph’s filing, his accuser — who was 9 in 2020, and is now 14 — is no longer at the family home.
The court document claims that she and her family “have abandoned their residence, no longer residing at the previously listed address.”
That is an interesting turn of phrase, because if the family had simply moved, one would expect different diction within the legal document — and for the court to issue a protective order covering the new residence.
Joseph claims that, by preventing him from visiting these six specific properties, the court is preventing him from performing work.
These alleged tasks involve mowing, landscaping, painting, repairs, and removing an “old dilapidated shed and its contents.”
He also wants contact with his own children
This is not the first time that Joseph has sought to modify the protective order.
He has also complained about the order preventing him from having contact with minors.
Joseph would like to be able to communicate with his four children.
He has not been permitted contact with them since March.
(Remember, he and Kendra are both facing separate charges in Arkansas for child endangerment and false imprisonment.)
Joseph is due in court for a hearing on the matter on June 20.
That is in less than four weeks.
He will be arguing both points — through his attorneys — seeing to get near his accuser’s allegedly abandoned home and seeing to be permitted to spend time with his own children.
The court will have to consider the facts, such as the victim’s current residence, and weigh the safety of Joseph’s children.
There is a lot at stake with child safety. But our legal system gives an inordinate amount of rights and authority to parents.
Next month, we’ll find out how the hearing goes.
Joseph Duggar Wants Court to Let Him Work Closer to Alleged Victim was originally published on The Hollywood Gossip.