The judge did not set a sentencing date and released him on bond. The actor faces up to three years in prison. He was acquitted on the sixth count, which related to a follow-up conversation with an investigator two weeks later. Smollett was convicted on five counts on Thursday, relating to conversations he had with the police just after the attack. Smollett with six counts of felony disorderly conduct. Webb, who reviewed that decision and ultimately announced that a grand jury had charged Mr. Smollett’s agreement to forfeit his $10,000 bond and perform community service. They were similarly critical in 2019 when the office of the city’s top prosecutor, Kim Foxx, who early on had recused herself from the case, citing a potential conflict, quietly dropped the charges in exchange for Mr. Smollett to recoup some of the city’s costs. Smollett quickly evaporated when investigators came to the conclusion three weeks later that he had staged the attack on himself.Ĭhicago officials, upset at the amount of police work that was spent on the case, have sued Mr. His account captured the attention of a politically polarized nation concerned with rising hate crime reports and the persistent threat of racism. Smollett said one of his attackers had even yelled, “This is MAGA country.” Smollett - known then for his role in the Fox music-industry drama “Empire” - told the police he had been the victim of a hate crime near his apartment building in Chicago. The case dated back to the frigid early hours of Jan. So we feel 100 percent confidence that this case will be won on appeal. You cannot say Jussie’s lying and Jussie is not lying for the same exact incident. We obviously respectfully disagree with the jury’s verdict.
I thought it was serious criminal misconduct that needed to be approached and have a public trial about it. For him to fake a hate crime, fake it and then cause the Police Department to spend enormous efforts taking them off of homicide cases and putting them on this case, I thought that was bad conduct. We made the right decision to take a trial, and we got a verdict that is obviously a resounding success for us. Now that they’ve decided that Smollett should have been convicted, I believe that we in the special prosecutor’s office made the right decision to reindict him. Transcript Prosecution and Defense React to Jussie Smollett Verdict Jussie Smollett, an actor in the Fox music-industry drama “Empire,” was found guilty of filing a false police report after staging a hate crime against himself.