SPRINGDALE (KFSM) — Joshua Duggar has petitioned to join a lawsuit that four of his sisters’ filed against the city of Springdale, Washington County, and parties affiliated with In Touch Weekly last month.
Jill Dillard, Jessa Seewald, Jinger Vuolo and Joy Duggar filed the lawsuit on Wednesday, May 18, seeking relief and damages for invasion of privacy. Joshua Duggar filed a petition to join the lawsuit on Friday (June 2).
The sisters talked to police in December 2006 as part of an investigation into reports that their brother, Joshua Duggar, had molested them and one other female in 2002 and 2003, the document states. Police promised the sisters, who were all minors at the time, that their statements would remain confidential and would not be disclosed to the public.
In May 2015, In Touch Weekly sent a Freedom of Information Act request for the incident report after getting an anonymous tip. The lawsuit alleges the city gave the magazine an under-redacted report that included the names of the sisters’ parents, the family’s address, and the age of at least one of the victims, which allowed the public to identify the four sisters.
Joshua Duggar’s lawyers argued that he suffered “severe emotional distress, embarrassment, humiliation and economic harm both to his
personal and professional reputations” after In Touch Weekly published information about the investigation. The document states that while his sisters suffered trauma and public humiliation, they also received sympathy as victims, which was not the case for Joshua Duggar.
