Melissa Gilbert says she’s leaving the New York apartment she shared with husband Timothy Busfield, describing the move in an Instagram post dated June 23. Her decision arrives as Busfield continues fighting New Mexico criminal charges, including a February in
When Melissa Gilbert wrote goodbye to a “perfect little one bedroom apartment” on New York’s Upper West Side. it didn’t read like a typical real-estate update. In the Instagram post dated June 23. the “Little House on the Prairie” actress tied her departure to a tense. ongoing legal fight involving her husband. Timothy Busfield.
Gilbert said she would miss walking through “our neighborhood. ” along with the people she met on subway rides and in the streets. She listed the familiar details she would be leaving behind — “our favorite newsstand. bodega. dance studio. and laundry” — and ended with a promise to return “right now…..well….you know.” She wrote she was “excited to live in our wonderful home upstate full time for a good long while.”.
The timing matters. Busfield, whom Gilbert married in 2013, is contesting criminal charges filed earlier this year in New Mexico.
In January, Busfield was arrested in connection with allegations involving minors on the set of Fox’s “The Cleaning Lady.” On Feb. 6, a New Mexico grand jury indicted Busfield on four counts of criminal sexual contact of a child. Busfield is seeking to have the indictment dismissed.
On June 18. Busfield filed a motion asking a New Mexico court to throw out his February indictment on child sex-abuse allegations. In the filing. the state is described as “abdicated” in its role of administering justice and instead pursuing an indictment “at the cost of evidence. Mr. Busfield’s rights, and the independence and integrity of the grand jury.”.
The charges stem from alleged incidents that prosecutors say occurred between late 2022 and early 2024, when Busfield was a director on “The Cleaning Lady.” Prosecutors allege he abused two twin boys — actors on the series — who were 7 and 8 at the time.
Gilbert, in the midst of all this, has publicly expressed confidence in her husband’s innocence. Speaking to “Good Morning America” in April. she said she is “100% confident [Busfield] will be exonerated.” She added: “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.”.
Busfield’s attorney, Larry Stein, has also maintained the case is not solid. In comments previously made in a statement. Stein said the indictment was “not unexpected.” He argued in connection with the proceedings that “the indictment was not unexpected. ” and went further in criticizing the evidence described in a detention hearing.
In remarks shared earlier. Stein said the “grand jury will indict a ham sandwich. ” and described what he called “fatal weaknesses in the State’s evidence — gaps that no amount of charging decisions can cure.” He also said. “This prosecution appears driven by something other than the facts or the law.” In that same statement. Stein said Busfield would “fight these charges at every stage” and look forward to “testing the State’s case in open court — where evidence matters — not behind closed doors.”.
The sequence is stark: a June 23 personal move out of New York’s Upper West Side is unfolding while a New Mexico indictment from Feb. 6 remains in play, and a June 18 motion tries to end the case before it proceeds. For Gilbert. the change is physical — a shift to an upstate home — but for Busfield. the next steps are legal. built around whether the indictment can survive and whether prosecutors’ evidence can withstand scrutiny.
As the couple turns toward their next chapter, the unresolved court fight continues to sit at the center of the story — just not in the spotlight of New York’s streets that Gilbert is now leaving behind.
Melissa Gilbert Timothy Busfield NYC apartment Upper West Side Instagram June 23 New Mexico indictment grand jury Feb. 6 criminal sexual contact of a child Larry Stein The Cleaning Lady Fox