Watch: Josh Duggar’s NSFW Jail Messages to Wife Anna Duggar Revealed
Amy Duggar King is lending support where she can.
Four months after her cousin Joseph Duggar was arrested over allegations that he molested a then-9-year-old girl in 2020, his cousin Amy confirmed she’s spoken with his alleged victim.
“I don’t want to speak for her or anything like that, but I will just tell you when I talked to this person—we’re just going to be respectful of the situation since she’s still so young—but I just gave her hope,” she said during her appearance on the July 14 episode of The Sarah Fraser Show. “I said, ‘This doesn’t have to destroy you. It really truly doesn’t.’”
The 39-year-old continued, “I just tried to offer her encouragement and I told her that if she ever just needed a safe place to talk, that I’m here and she just said, ‘Thank you so much.’”
Following his March arrest, Joseph—whose brother Josh Duggar is serving a 12-year sentence for possession of child sex abuse content—was charged with lewd and lascivious molestation of a victim under 12 and lewd and lascivious behavior conducted by a person over 18.
He entered a written plea of not guilty in the case via his attorney, while also waiving arraignment and demanding a jury trial in the matter, according to a court document viewed by E! News on March 31. (Joseph and wife Kendra Duggar, parents to four children, are also facing child endangerment and false imprisonment charges in a separate case, of which they’ve both pleaded not guilty.)
During her conversation with Joseph’s alleged victim, Amy also wanted to relay the impact her coming forward has already had.
Sara Fraser Show/Youtube & Office of the Sheriff Washington County, Arkansas
“I said, ‘You speaking out and you being so honest and vulnerable, knowing the backlash and knowing the people that would turn their backs on you and not believe you and all the things,’” she recounted, “I was like, ‘You are such a strong person.’”
But more than anything, Amy hopes the alleged victim is able to find peace.
“I hope she sleeps at night,” she noted. “I hope she finds healing. I told her about counseling, and I told her about, how important that is, to go and to talk it out loud and to clear her conscience, and it’s not on her.”
Amy—who appeared alongside Joseph and the rest of the Duggars on the TLC series 19 Kids and Counting—confirmed the conversation occurred after she reached out to the family of the victim.
“I think they’re doing the best that they can,” she said of the family. “I think they are just trying to find peace in all of this. I think right now, they’re also focused on getting healing for the victim. I think that is no. 1 priority for them. And I do believe that their heart is in the right place.”
E! News reached out to Joseph’s legal team for comment but has not yet heard back.
And this isn’t the first time Amy has addressed her cousin’s arrest.
“I am sickened, heartbroken and deeply angry,” she said in a March 20 statement to People. “My first thoughts are with the victim, a child who deserved to be safe, protected and surrounded by people she could trust.”
“For years, I have spoken out about the importance of truth, accountability and protecting children, even when it meant going against my own family,” she continued. “Family ties should never equal automatic trust or access, especially when it comes to the safety of children.”
For more on what the larger Duggar family has said about Joseph’s arrest, read on.
Duggar Family/Instagram
Kris Connor/Getty Images
Instagram/Jana Duggar
Insatgram/Jason Duggar
Jinger Duggar Vuolo/Instagram
Amy Duggar King/Instagram
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