Josh Duggar of ‘19 Kids & Counting’ leaves rehab after 6 months
Josh Duggar in Times Square on March 11, 2014. He checked himself into rehab in August 2015, the family said at the time. Credit: Getty Images for Extra / D Dipasupil
Josh Duggar, who was at the center of a child molestation scandal that led to the cancellation of his family’s reality show, “19 Kids & Counting,” has finished a six-month stint in rehab, his family says.
“Josh has completed his residential rehabilitation program,” the Duggar family wrote in an undated post on its official website. “We are so thankful for everyone who worked with Josh in this program. It was a crucial first step in recovery and healing for Josh.”
Duggar, who turned 28 on March 3, had checked himself in during August, the family said at the time, at a facility “Entertainment Tonight” and People magazine identified as the faith-based Reformers Unanimous in Rockford, Illinois. While its director of development, Tony Richardson, declined to confirm Duggar’s presence, citing patient confidentiality, the center and the Duggars have a relationship, with family heads Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar delivering a keynote address there in October 2014, People said.
“Josh has now returned to Arkansas,” the family statement continued, “where he will continue professional counseling and focus on rebuilding relationships with his family. We look to God for help and guidance and place all of our trust in Him. We are forever grateful for the love and prayers offered by so many and hope you will continue to pray in the days ahead.”
In May 2015, after the leak of a police report alleging he had fondled five young girls, including two of his sisters, when he was in his midteens, Duggar, who is married with four children, said without giving specifics that he had “acted inexcusably for which I am extremely sorry.”
Days before he entered rehab, Gawker.com revealed Duggar held two subscriptions to the infidelity-arrangement website AshleyMadison.com. Duggar subsequently issued a statement calling himself “the biggest hypocrite ever. . . . While espousing faith and family values, I have been unfaithful to my wife.” He added that, “The last few years, while publicly stating I was fighting against immorality in our country I was hiding my own personal failures.”
The scandal led to cable network TLC canceling “19 Kids & Counting.”
