Josh Duggar ‘ s legal defense team has filed documents requesting a judgment of acquittal or a new trial in the weeks following his conviction on two child pornography charges .
Of course , the former 19 Kids & Counting star was convicted in a federal courthouse in Arkansas last month on two counts of receiving and possessing child pornography . And now, while he is awaiting sentencing later this spring, his legal team is trying to pull out all the stops to free him from the consequences.
Related: How Josh And His Family Reacted To His Guilty Verdict In The Child Porn Trial
Duggar’ s lead defense attorney, Justin Gelfand , just filed a new 75-page document asking for an acquittal in the case pursuant to a technical federal legal rule. Alternatively, Gelfand is also asking the court for the new trial for his client if the first acquittal motion will be declined. Gelfand quoted the rule in question, called Rule 29, within asking the judge to set aside Duggar’ s guilty verdict:
“ ‘ If the jury has returned a guilty verdict, the court may set aside the judgement and enter an acquittal, ’ where, as here, ‘ the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the government, is usually such that a reasonably minded jury must have a reasonable doubt as to the existence of any of the essential elements of the crime charged, ’ this ‘ Court must grant a Rule 29 motion for judgment of acquittal. ’ The evidence elicited at trial does not support a conviction on either count — even inside the light most favorable to the Government. The Government failed to adduce any evidence that Duggar ‘ knew that the visual depictions were of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct. ‘”
At issue here, according to Gelfand, is that the government allegedly failed “ in order to timely disclose exculpatory evidence” towards the defense in advance of the particular trial.
That supposed lack of pre-trial evidence disclosure centers on a former employee of Duggar’ s used car lot — the location where police initially descended to arrest typically the now-disgraced reality TV star — and where they claim to be able to have found the evidence of child pornography upon a shared work computer .
Related: Anna Duggar Is Still Committed To Josh — Here’ s What She’ s Been Doing Since The Trial
Gelfand argues throughout the docs that this former employee “ had access for you to the car lot and this HP desktop computer during certain relevant time periods, ” and suggested it could have been that employee who was accessing child porn , and not Duggar. The attorney claimed that “ law enforcement failed to meaningfully investigate the possibility that anyone other than Duggar may have committed the crimes billed. ”
According to help the docs, the prosecution interviewed the former car lot worker several weeks before the start of the trial, but never called him to the stand as a witness. Gelfand has seized upon how the staff allegedly changed his story after that interview, telling federal prosecutors that he was “ mistaken” about whether he was at the car lot during several specific dates in May of 2019. That is a crucial point for Duggar’ s defense, because during often the trial, prosecutors argued that forensic evidence proved Duggar was “ the only person present at the car lot” when child porn was downloaded by the office computer during that same period.
Now, Gelfand is arguing that the previous employee’ s interview — plus his changed story about your dates he was supposedly in the car lot — negatively impacted Duggar’ s shot at a new fair trial. The defense attorney wrote in the court docs:
“ This deprived the defense of the exact ability to impeach these witnesses with evidence that yet another person had access to passwords. Had the defense possessed this information when it became available, it would have meaningfully affected trial strategy and provided additional fodder with regard to cross-examination of Government witnesses. … [this] effectively precluded Duggar from presenting a necessary defense witness. ”
To sum it all up, Gelfand argues that the feds “ violated Duggar’ s Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights in addition to this court should grant him a new trial. ”
Wow! Those are obviously some pretty significant claims. We’ ll see if it all leads anywhere. For now, Duggar remains in jail in Washington County, Arkansas as he awaits sentencing on the child porn conviction.
[Image via Washington County Sheriff’s Office ]
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