(CW: CSA) Josh & Anna 51: An Unappealing Appeal

[Idlewild]

Those letters…Michelle writes like a teenager, Anna- pretty much what you’d expect.

David Waller- it’s all about Josh improving the Kellers’ trailer.

Odd that the widow doesn’t want to come forward and testify - or maybe she is horrified she let him around her children? And yes, where did he get the money?
Didn’t want the limelight? He took a high profile job in Washington and was happy to have grinning selfies with every right wing politician he could pin down. Their social media was public, his children recorded a CD with the Duggars and Anna whined her kids weren’t shown very often on TV.

I’m sure he enjoys sharing the gospel with a bunch of people he feels superior to who provide an echo chamber that he is innocent. Well if Ron the axe murderer doesn’t think he did it, what the hell do the jury who heard all the evidence know??
Perhaps the most tone deaf is the lady who claims to be a nurse and says she knows what abused children look like and the Ms aren’t - he isn’t accused of abusing them. What does she think of the children in those videos? Appalling testimony that ignores the damage caused by CSA and the people that use that material.

The silence of the siblings is deafening.

[formergothardite]

Does David Waller think that repeating Joshua Duggar in like every sentence will make the judge be more sympathetic? Also I would think telling the judge that the kids are praying for him might backfire. 
 

All these letters show people who are completely out of touch with reality. 

[imokit]

Why would anyone think that reminding a judge that Josh has kids who miss him and think he's a good father is a good idea?

 

It reminds the judge that he vulnerable kids at home who Josh will have access to once he's released.  It shows that none of the adults around those children understand the severity of Josh's crimes and the risk he poses to children.  None of those people writing letters - the mother, grandmother and uncle of the children can be trusted to protect them if they see any worrying signs.

Nice normal criminals are the most dangerous ones, as you can get away with more things if people like you.  Who cares if Josh can be nice, and do nice things, they don't outweigh the bad. 

They've told the judge that Josh regularly had his children with him in the same place he watched children being tortured.

 

I can't see how any of those letters can help Josh, all they do is remind the judge of how dangerous he is, how young his children are, how blind his family are to his faults.

Maybe if he was in trouble for a one off robbery or something, it would be helpful, but not for CSAM.

 

[Cam]

4 hours ago, Idlewild said:

Those letters…Michelle writes like a teenager, Anna- pretty much what you’d expect.

David Waller- it’s all about Josh improving the Kellers’ trailer.

Odd that the widow doesn’t want to come forward and testify - or maybe she is horrified she let him around her children? And yes, where did he get the money?
Didn’t want the limelight? He took a high profile job in Washington and was happy to have grinning selfies with every right wing politician he could pin down. Their social media was public, his children recorded a CD with the Duggars and Anna whined her kids weren’t shown very often on TV.

I’m sure he enjoys sharing the gospel with a bunch of people he feels superior to who provide an echo chamber that he is innocent. Well if Ron the axe murderer doesn’t think he did it, what the hell do the jury who heard all the evidence know??
Perhaps the most tone deaf is the lady who claims to be a nurse and says she knows what abused children look like and the Ms aren’t - he isn’t accused of abusing them. What does she think of the children in those videos? Appalling testimony that ignores the damage caused by CSA and the people that use that material.

The silence of the siblings is deafening.

In my mind I pictured a screen play typed out:

Ron the Axe Murderer: Josh, all us prisoners now think you’re innocent!

Josh Duggar: Praise the Lord! You saw the light! 
 

Maybe the widow was excluded/not permitted by the church from writing a sweeping endorsement of her benefactor since she doesn’t have a headship.

 

1 minute ago, imokit said:

Why would anyone think that reminding a judge that Josh has kids who miss him and think he's a good father is a good idea?

Nice normal criminals are the most dangerous ones, as you can get away with more things if people like you.  Who cares if Josh can be nice, and do nice things, they don't outweigh the bad. 

They've told the judge that Josh regularly had his children with him in the same place he watched children being tortured.

I can't see how any of those letters can help Josh, all they do is remind the judge of how dangerous he is, how young his children are, how blind his family are to his faults.

 

It really creeped me out when one of the letters mentioned Anna and the kids visited Josh at the car lot.

[JermajestyDuggar]

4 hours ago, Idlewild said:

The silence of the siblings is deafening.

It reminds me of Alan Smith’s bio sisters. They would never write a nice letter about him even though their parents would. 

[Howl]

9 hours ago, Smee said:

So much this. Many, many sexual abusers are charming/charismatic nice guys who share the load at home and help their kids with homework and coach the soccer team

I'm remembering a relatively recent case in my city of an abuser who was just a wonderful guy, great family man, fantastic husband, successful professional who was drugging the children of family friends with slushy drinks and abusing them.  It was definitely a "this is the very last guy anyone would suspect of being a..." 

Also, actor Stephen Collins, who played  Reverend Eric Camden, the lovely father on wholesome family show 7th Heaven from 1996-2007. 

He confessed to exposing himself to girls between 10 - 13 in a marriage counseling session recorded by his now ex wife.  He's so far escaped any form of legal accountability. 

The Daily Mail article, but seems accurate: Actor who played the pastor dad on 7th Heaven 'admitted to molesting underage girls'... 

[FluffySnowball]

On 5/4/2022 at 12:04 AM, myusername said:

Oh..... There's sex. For sure.

Just not the kind he prefers.

I’ve heard that from multiple sources over the years and I gotta say that that’s a huge problem.

No matter what anyone has done, be it murder, rape, or the consumption of CSA material, getting raped isn’t an acceptable punishment under any circumstance. And the fact that sexual abuse seems to be a common occurrence in American jails/prisons shows me that the government is at fault. Of course the government can’t just wave a magic wand and ensure that abuse never happens behind bars, but it must make any effort possible to protect inmates. 

ETA: I’m aware this isn’t just an American problem, but if I’m not mistaken, it seems to be even more prevalent in the US than in some other developed nations. Maybe cause US penitentiary facilities are in private hands and run for profit? I’m just guessing, though. 

Edited May 13, 2022 by FluffySnowball

[SisterCupcake]

5 hours ago, Idlewild said:

The silence of the siblings is deafening.

And Jim Bob. Mom wrote a half baked letter, but nothing from dad. I know he wasn't at the trial either (except maybe 1 day?), I think that's weird too.

[Idlewild]

I’m not altogether surprised that JB hasn’t written a letter. He had his arse handed to him by the judge in the preliminary hearing and it’s clear JB thinks the whole thing is a travesty. Any letter from him would undoubtedly do more harm than good.

[FluffySnowball]

This is just a minuscule aspect and unimportant in the grand scheme of things, but what possessed Michelle to decorate her name in the letter to the judge with a heart?! Like, seriously… that’s something you can do in private correspondence only. But she doesn’t just do it in an official letter, she does it in regards to Josh’s CSA trial. I just can’t believe it. Is this to seem cute and innocent? It just looks weird to me. 

[gustava]

13 hours ago, SPHASH said:

Cracker Sweeping Sex Pest needs to be the next post count title!

The first three words:  Definitely!  But a pest is simply annoying.  Josh is a convicted felon.

Maybe:  Cracker Sweeping Sex Felon

 

[SorenaJ]

51 minutes ago, FluffySnowball said:

This is just a minuscule aspect and unimportant in the grand scheme of things, but what possessed Michelle to decorate her name in the letter to the judge with a heart?! Like, seriously… that’s something you can do in private correspondence only. But she doesn’t just do it in an official letter, she does it in regards to Josh’s CSA trial. I just can’t believe it. Is this to seem cute and innocent? It just looks weird to me. 

Michelle and her tone deaf stupid hearts. Honestly.. 

[Whydon'ttheyspeakintongues]

Josh Duggar did not personally give Clark Wilson's widow $2K each month.  He ran a fundraising page for the family - so while he may have been the one who handed the money over, it was not his money. (I remember this because it was posted on their facebook page right before the Ashley Maddison scandal and everyone jumped in the comments to let off a bit of steam about it).

 

[formergothardite]

The judge is going to read about the horrific things Josh downloaded and then read that the best people can say about him is that he swept up crackers and brought some meds to someone who had diarrhea. And that his community really, really wants him back at home surrounded by small children. I really don't see how these letters can help. 

[Anne Of Gray Gables]

48 minutes ago, formergothardite said:

The judge is going to read about the horrific things Josh downloaded and then read that the best people can say about him is that he swept up crackers and brought some meds to someone who had diarrhea. And that his community really, really wants him back at home surrounded by small children. I really don't see how these letters can help. 

I don't think the judge will give a half shit about these letters either way.  He's used to men like Josh and probably goes straight to "blah, blah, blah" mode.

The letters are bad enough, but I am oddly disturbed by Michelle's stupid heart over her signature.  Yes, I get she's probably mentally stunted from meeting JB at a young age and marrying at 17, but it's still so strange given the context here.  Seriously, I think the judge may be questioning that more than anything else.

And then there's the crackers.  These people are all such freaks. 

[Alisamer]

I hope the judge reads the defense letters first. "He has so many small children who love him!" followed by the prosecution "He had hundreds of images of small children being sexually tortured." Surely 2+2 will equal 4 and the judge will think "wait, should I really send this guy home to his multiple children, many the same ages as the victims in the CSAM he watched?" 

I'm hoping he gets the maximum, but if not, then at least enough that the kids are a bit older when he comes home. 

If the judge can take into account the fact that he "purposed" to be debt free and he swept up some crackers one time, they can take into account that his kids are the ages he appears to be attracted to and based on the letters from the defense, have no one in their life they trust to protect them. 

[Pammy]

I wonder if Michelle's "little heart over the i" signature might actually be her official, legal signature.

My teens are just now choosing their official legal signatures (on their passports) and I had to talk one into using a capital letter for the beginning of her first and last name. Being currently a teenager, she thinks it's cool to use all small letters? It's possible that teenage Michelle locked herself into a childish format under similar circumstances, with no one to talk her out of it.

[Antimony]

1 minute ago, Pammy said:

I wonder if Michelle's "little heart over the i" signature might actually be her official, legal signature.

My teens are just now choosing their official legal signatures (on their passports) and I had to talk one into using a capital letter for the beginning of her first and last name. Being currently a teenager, she thinks it's cool to use all small letters? It's possible that teenage Michelle locked herself into a childish format under similar circumstances, with no one to talk her out of it.

I don't know if you're not in the US, but at least here there is no official legal signature. You can change it any time you like. She could have simply...not put the heart. It's not a locked format and there's nothing stopping her from changing it, even just once for this.

I have a rather long name (at least, compared to my cultural group) so sometimes my signature is my full name. Sometimes it is a shortened version of my name, etc. It would take...so long...to write it on the little check out kiosks where you have to sign at the pharmacy if I signed it in full every time. I changed my name at 18, so it took a while throughout adulthood to decide how to write it again most frequently because well...new name.

On 5/12/2022 at 11:36 AM, Mama Mia said:

Nah. I think he was purposefully  using Tor on his iPhone to view adult, legal porn because he could attempt to use that as a defense if caught by Ana or Praying Eyes or his Daddy or the Government with his actual interest - extremely violent CSAM of extremely young children. He wanted to be able to say he accidentally came across it without realizing what it was. That he used Tor all the time for legal porn because he knows he’s not supposed to watch porn at all. 
Personally I think that could have been his reason for asking the Fed about CSAM as the reason for the search — so he could attempt an “I didn’t realize it was bad illegal children stuff until after I downloaded it, but didn’t know what to do” . But his lawyers probably advised the wasn’t me strategy  based on the amount and type.

( my other theory about his disclosure to the fed is the opposite - that he was wanting consequences, just like when he told JB about the initial molestations, told the Holt lady about the extent of his abuse that was unknown at the time, etc )

Anyway, I don’t think he was accidentally or smugly bumbling along with his disclosures or tech choices. 

Going back to this -- I don't think this is possible with the given timeline. The raid records indicate that as soon as they informed Josh they had a warrant, cybercrime, etc etc he said, "I want to call my lawyer" and got his phone out of his pocket so they were like, "Actually we have a warrant for that phone too -- YOINK!" 

I don't see how he could possibly plan that. I think the case was that he was watching some porn on his iPhone (either with Tor or not, because it would be weird to use Tor to get to the surface web) and that was clear after they seized it. It was likely not brought up at trial because the defense called it prejudicial and the Government didn't think it was their most important point. 

I don't think Josh is smart enough to come up with this idea on the fly, and he couldn't have known the Feds were coming that day, so they may have actually, literally, caught him with his pants down.  

[SassyPants]

Admittedly I know little about the inner workings of our justice system as it pertains to sentencing. How much weight is given to the individual felon’s personal life circumstances and crimes committed as opposed to the what a general sentence might be for a similar felon convicted of a similar crime? In other words, if the judge is to consider personal testimonials about Josh’s great and generous works (surprised my keyboard didn’t spontaneously combust just typing those words) when coming up with an equitable sentence, shouldn’t s/he also have to take into consideration the ages of Josh’s minor children when considering the sentence? I know this is likely pie-in-the-sky thinking, but I’d say a 12-15 year sentence would be adequate. Let’s get the latest M to puberty before he is released back to the home and society. I am aware that he was not convicted on crimes against his own children. OTOH, he does have a history of molesting his own sisters, even if the judge can not legally use those crimes when sentencing.

[Mama Mia]

43 minutes ago, Antimony said:

I don't know if you're not in the US, but at least here there is no official legal signature. You can change it any time you like. She could have simply...not put the heart. It's not a locked format and there's nothing stopping her from changing it, even just once for this.

I have a rather long name (at least, compared to my cultural group) so sometimes my signature is my full name. Sometimes it is a shortened version of my name, etc. It would take...so long...to write it on the little check out kiosks where you have to sign at the pharmacy if I signed it in full every time. I changed my name at 18, so it took a while throughout adulthood to decide how to write it again most frequently because well...new name.

Going back to this -- I don't think this is possible with the given timeline. The raid records indicate that as soon as they informed Josh they had a warrant, cybercrime, etc etc he said, "I want to call my lawyer" and got his phone out of his pocket so they were like, "Actually we have a warrant for that phone too -- YOINK!" 

I don't see how he could possibly plan that. I think the case was that he was watching some porn on his iPhone (either with Tor or not, because it would be weird to use Tor to get to the surface web) and that was clear after they seized it. It was likely not brought up at trial because the defense called it prejudicial and the Government didn't think it was their most important point. 

I don't think Josh is smart enough to come up with this idea on the fly, and he couldn't have known the Feds were coming that day, so they may have actually, literally, caught him with his pants down.  

Sorry I wasn’t clear. I don’t think he installed Tor on his phone to cover his tracks AFTER the raid, or in anticipation of the raid. I think he had installed it previously just to have an excuse and cover for his on-going illegal CSAM viewing. He put Tor and regular porn on his phone as an on-going cover story in case he was caught by ANYONE . It would make it more plausible to say “ yes, I’m a sinner who watches grown people do bad dirty porn on my phone. I hide that by using Tor so my wife doesn’t get mad  if she just looks at my phone. I was shocked when actually illegal CSAM were in the videos I downloaded. I thought I was getting Bad Barely Legal Teens volume 300. “

[Anne Of Gray Gables]

20 minutes ago, SassyPants said:

Admittedly I know little about the inner workings of our justice system as it pertains to sentencing. How much weight is given to the individual felon’s personal life circumstances and crimes committed as opposed to the what a general sentence might be for a similar felon convicted of a similar crime? In other words, if the judge is to consider personal testimonials about Josh’s great and generous works (surprised my keyboard didn’t spontaneously combust just typing those words) when coming up with an equitable sentence, shouldn’t s/he also have to take into consideration the ages of Josh’s minor children when considering the sentence? I know this is likely pie-in-the-sky thinking, but I’d say a 12-15 year sentence would be adequate. Let’s get the latest M to puberty before he is released back to the home and society. I am aware that he was not convicted on crimes against his own children. OTOH, he does have a history of molesting his own sisters, even if the judge can not legally use those crimes when sentencing.

Everyone has a story; most of these guys have families.  I don't think the judge will be impressed by the silly letters.

With that said, 12 - 15 years seems high based on past sentences handed down by this judge. I can only see that happening if he puts a lot of weight on teen Josh's behavior. The state may be stretching their claim of number of images downloaded as well.  We'll know soon enough where he's going and for how long.

 

[Bastet]

Is it reasonable to assume that Josh’s children have been questioned about their dad and that any findings—either exculpatory or not—would  be conveyed to the judge but not released to the public?

[irish_dancing_canadian]

4 hours ago, FluffySnowball said:

This is just a minuscule aspect and unimportant in the grand scheme of things, but what possessed Michelle to decorate her name in the letter to the judge with a heart?! Like, seriously… that’s something you can do in private correspondence only. But she doesn’t just do it in an official letter, she does it in regards to Josh’s CSA trial. I just can’t believe it. Is this to seem cute and innocent? It just looks weird to me. 

This just proves how out of touch with reality she is. 

[twoandthrough]

Amy and Deanna are here for it. Check Instagram for details. 👏

[Jackie3]

6 hours ago, imokit said:

Why would anyone think that reminding a judge that Josh has kids who miss him and think he's a good father is a good idea?

 

If Josh was a good father, then of course his kids will miss him. Of course they will suffer. Josh caused that suffering, not the prison system.

Having worked with kids whose parents are incarcerated, I should add -- some kids are both sad AND relieved. Life is easier when a criminal parent is out of the home.

After reading about the CSA Josh viewed, I shudder to think about him being home in five years. Many of the videos he watched had a girl of 6-7, the same age little Madyson will be. I wish I hadn't read those sentencing papers.

To answer your question--I think the Duggars and their friends are living in a fantasy world. They've always played the "Christian father of many children" card with great success. It's usually gotten them what they want ("Go to that carlot. the owner is a Christian dad with six kids"). They can't believe it doesn't work in this situation.

Edited May 13, 2022 by Jackie3