'The West Wing' Actor Timothy Busfield Charged with Child Sexual Abuse

Timothy Busfield is facing some very serious allegations.

The 68-year-old actor, best known for playing Danny Concannon on The West Wing, is facing two counts of criminal sexual contact with a minor and one count of child abuse.

In an arrest warrant issued by the Albuquerque Police Department and obtained by People, authorities allege that Busfield engaged in unlawful sexual conduct with two boys, 11-year-old twins, with one minor alleging that the incidents began when he was 7.

Keep reading to find out more…An investigation began on November 1, 2024 after a doctor at the University of New Mexico Hospital (UNMH) alerted police about alleged sexual abuse.

According to the arrest warrent, the victims’ parents claim that the boys were child actors when they met Busfield on set of the Fox series The Cleaning Lady, where he served as a director. When Busfield joined the series, which ran from 2022 until 2025, he allegedly “grew closer to the boys.”

“It was reported that Timothy would tell his children to call him ‘Uncle Tim,’” the warrant alleged. The victims’ parents told the officer “that they both discovered that there were allegations against Timothy of sexual assault against both women and minors.”

After the father was told that “there had been multiple rumors that Busfield had been ‘handsy’ with women,” the siblings’ mother asked her sons, “Who were eleven years old at the time, if anyone had ever touched them in a manner that made them feel uncomfortable. The children allegedly responded by asking, ‘You mean like Uncle Tim?’” according to the warrant.

The parents were advised by a lawyer to take the boys to UNMH where they say professionals suggested the boys “were groomed.”

The siblings had not disclosed any sexual contact at this time, but claimed that Busfield “would tickle them on the stomach and legs.” It was then determined that the case did not meet the accepted criteria at the time.

Then on October 3, 2025, the mother filed a police report and told Child Protective Services that “her children both disclosed that there was sexual abuse by Timothy from around November 2022 to Spring 2024.” She told authorities that one of her sons told his counselor that Busfield had inappropriately touched him.

When one of the victims was 10, his therapist diagnosed him with moderate post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety following claims of “inappropriate touching.” The therapist said that the child began “having nightmares about the director touching him and waking up scared” and claimed that Busfield “had touched and rubbed his penis 3 or 4 times and appeared to be ashamed.”

The warrant added that the boy “said he was afraid to tell anyone because Tim was the Director, and he feared Tim would get mad at him.” The mother also claimed in the warrant that crew members used to hand out iPads to the parents on set to watch their children filming in a different area, but said that after Busfield was hired, this practice stopped.

According to the warrant, Busfield allegedly told police that the parents were upset their sons had been replaced with a younger actor. Shortly after, he got a call from Warner Bros. informing him they were investigating a complaint.

“Timothy said Warner Brothers,, had an outside investigation through another firm, do an investigation. Timothy was told there were complaints about him from the boys. Timothy acknowledged that the boys involved were [Victim 1] and [Victim 2].”

Busfield also alleged that he had been told by an actress on The Cleaning Lady that the mother of the alleged victims “wanted revenge.”

When asked by investigators if he ever picked up or tickled the boys, Busfield allegedly said it was “highly likely that he would have” because he wanted “a playful environment.”

“It’s not allowed at all,” Busfield allegedly told investigators of touching on set. “There is no, there’s no protocol. I mean, I’m always around people, right? It would be, you know, in front of the parents.”

“There would never be a weird moment about it. I don’t really remember picking those boys up,” he continued. “I remember picking up the boy who followed them. I’d pick him up, and he’d be giggling, and that would sort of get him ready to act.”

Busfield also allegedly said that he and wife Melissa Gilbert had a relationship with the boys and their parents “outside of work,” buying them “Christmas gifts and were together on several social functions.”

Through the investigation, a production assistant alleged that the alleged victim would be unsupervised on set and that his on-set teacher would not keep track of him. The officer in the warrant said that after speaking to several people from the production, “I believe Timothy had the opportunity to be alone with [the victim] while he was lying in the bed on the TV set.”

After receiving the results of the internal investigation by Warner Bros., it was documented that an individual “claimed to have witnessed the incident in the Hair and Make-Up trailer, executive producer/director Tim Busfield entered and kissed a minor male on the face as the minor was getting a haircut” in December 2024.

“In my training and experience, pedophiles often infiltrate families under a trusted role, like Timothy, who, as a producer, exploited the hectic film sets to tickle and touch [the victim] on his penis and buttocks, masking it as play,” the officer wrote in the warrant. “He would invite the family to off-set gatherings, with his wife buying Christmas gifts to foster closeness, making SL feel special and dependent— classic grooming to erode boundaries, isolate the victim, and silence suspicions by blending abuse into normalcy.”

“This dual tactic, charming parents while secretly violating the child, builds a web of complicity that is hard to unravel, delaying detection, as families trust the abuser’s facade,” he added.

Also according to the warrant, Busfield faced prior sexual assault allegations dating back to 1994.

As of right now, Timothy Busfield has not publicly addressed the charges.