The “Little House on the Prairie” star said that she and Busfield are “grieving” all of their “plans” and “dreams” in the wake of his January arrest.

Melissa Gilbert defends Timothy Busfield amid child sex abuse case: ‘Our life as we knew it is done’

The "Little House on the Prairie" star said that she and Busfield are "grieving" all of their "plans" and "dreams" in the wake of his January arrest.

By Emlyn Travis

Emlyn Travis

Emlyn Travis is a news writer at **. She has been working at EW since 2022. Her work has previously appeared on MTV News, Teen Vogue, and NME.

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April 2, 2026 10:43 a.m. ET

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Melissa Gilbert Speaks Out on 'Good Morning America'; Timothy Busfield at the Bernalillo County Courthouse on Jan. 20, 2026. Credit:

ABC News; Sam Wasson/Getty

Melissa Gilbert is voicing her support for her husband, Timothy Busfield, amid his ongoing child sex abuse case.

The *Little House on the Prairie *star shed light on going through “the most traumatizing experience of our lives” following Busfield’s January arrest in a preview clip from her upcoming *Good Morning America *interview with George Stephanopoulos.

“What has this whole episode been like for you?” Stephanopoulos asked Gilbert, to which she replied, “Hell. This has been the most traumatizing experience of our lives. Our life as we knew it is done.”

Timothy Busfield on Feb. 5, 2020.

Steven Ferdman/Getty

She continued, “We are grieving what we had. All of our plans, all of our dreams, all of our ideas, all of our projects… For Tim, it’s done. He’s canceled and this will never — even if he’s exonerated, he will always be that guy.”

Gilbert described Busfield as “the last person in the world who would hurt a child,” adding, “And believe me, if I thought for a second that Tim Busfield hurt a child, he’d have a lot more to worry about than prison.”

A representative for Gilbert told PEOPLE that she, alongside Busfield’s lawyer Larry Stein, chose to sit down with Stephanopoulos because she “decided it was time to sit down to clarify the facts of the case, which seem to have become lost to distraction, selective information, and clickbait.” Their conversation will air in full on Monday, April 6.

Melissa Gilbert (L) and Timothy Busfield on June 20, 2023.

VALERY HACHE/AFP via Getty

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The Albuquerque Police Department issued a warrant for Busfield’s arrest on Jan. 9, which alleged that he inappropriately touched twin 11-year-old boys when they worked on the Fox series *The Cleaning Lady*, for which Busfield served as producer and director. Busfield surrendered to police on Jan. 13 and issued a statement denying all of the allegations against him.

"I'm going to confront these lies," he said at the time. "They're horrible. They're all lies. And I did not do anything to those little boys, and I'm going to fight it. I'm going to fight it with a great team, and I'm going to be exonerated."

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Gilbert was one of 75 individuals who penned a letter of support for Busfield to a New Mexico judge ahead of the director’s Jan. 20 pretrial detention hearing. She was crying in court after the judge ruled at the hearing that Busfield would be released with conditions ahead of his forthcoming trial.

"This is the strangest letter I've ever had to write," Gilbert explained in her note at the time. "I began this letter with logic, but now the feelings have taken over. I can't help it. I only want this extraordinary man safe and whole.”

She continued, “So, I will close by asking you to please, please take care of my sweet husband. As he is my protector, I am his, but I cannot protect him now, and I think that, more than anything else, is what is truly breaking my heart. I am relying on you to protect him for me."

Busfield was indicted on four felony counts of criminal sexual contact of a minor (a child under the age of 13) by a grand jury in Bernalillo County, N.M., on Feb. 6. He officially pleaded not guilty on Feb. 11.

The actor and director's trial is scheduled to begin on May 10, 2027, and the proceedings are expected to last three weeks, PEOPLE reports. If found guilty, Busfield could be sentenced to at least three years in state prison.

Watch Gilbert discuss her husband’s arrest in the clip above. The full interview is set to air on April 6.

*If you suspect child abuse, call the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child or 1-800-422-4453, or go to www.childhelp.org. All calls are toll-free and confidential. The hotline is available 24/7 in more than 170 languages.*

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