False report charge
Angry top cop: Gun victims should get this much media
Jussie Smollett paid two brothers to attack him over salary dispute, say police.
Jussie Smollett, upset by his salary and seeking publicity, staged a fake assault a week after writing himself a threatening letter, Chicago police said Thursday after the “Empire” actor surrendered to face a felony charge of filing a false police report.
Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson, visibly angry at a morning news conference, said Smollett had taken advantage of the pain and anger of racism, draining resources that could have been used to investigate other crimes for which people were actually suffering.
“I just wish that the families of gun violence in this city got this much attention,” he said.
At an afternoon bail hearing, a judge set Smollett’s bond at $100,000. He was released Thursday evening after posting it.
In Thursday’s proceedings, members of Smollett’s family were in the courtroom with him as the judge, John Fitzgerald Lyke Jr., said he found the investigators’ account of the incident disturbing, particularly the assertion that Smollett had used a rope around his neck to heighten outrage.
“We live in a country where you are presumed innocent,” the judge said. “However, if these allegations are true, I find them utterly outrageous. Especially the violent, despicable use of a noose, which conjures such evil in our country.”
Smollett did not react, although occasionally he whispered to his legal team during the 25-minute proceeding. One of the lawyers, Jack Prior, agreed the police account was outrageous but said it also was not true.
“He wants nothing more than for the truth to come out,” Prior said.
Police say Smollett hired two brothers to carry out the assault and paid them $3,500. They have a copy of the check used to pay them, police said. Also recovered, they said, were phone records that showed Smollett speaking to the brothers an hour before the incident took place, and then an hour after.
In a document prepared for the bail hearing, prosecutors said they had video of the brothers at the scene, text messages they shared with Smollett and their testimony as to how Smollett had recruited them for the plan. He even had them visit the scene of what investigators contend was the fake attack on an earlier night, prosecutors said.
But, the prosecutor’s document said, a video camera at the spot Smollett had hoped would capture a phony attack was pointed in the wrong direction.
Johnson declined to indicate why investigators now believe Smollett had also played the chief role in mailing himself a threatening letter. The letter, which arrived a week before the reported assault, contained a white powder (crushed ibuprofen) and a sketch of what appeared to be a man being hanged and phrases, including “You will die.” The return address said “MAGA,” a reference to a slogan from Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.
Johnson referred further comment about the letter to the FBI, which is investigating . The agency declined to comment.
The felony disorderly conduct charge Smollett faces carries a maximum sentence of three years in prison.
After his arrest, the reversal in public opinion for Smollett was quick and damaging. The report of the attack spurred a national outpouring of support, including from Democratic presidential candidates and Trump.”
Fox, the network that airs “Empire,” released a statement Thursday saying it was evaluating the situation and the network’s options. “We understand the seriousness of this matter, and we respect the legal process,” the statement said.
Smollett’s official salary has not been made public, but he reportedly earned between $65,000 and $100,000 an episode on “Empire.” It was not immediately apparent whether he had had any clashes with executives at Fox, who issued a statement highly supportive of the actor.
At their news conference and the bail hearing, police officials and prosecutors unveiled much of what they had uncovered about the reported attack. Smollett, 36, who is black and openly gay, had told police that at roughly 2 a.m. Jan. 29, two masked men attacked him on the 300 block of Lower East North Water Street in downtown Chicago. He said his assailants directed homophobic and racial slurs at him, put a rope around his neck and poured a chemical substance on him.
Police said they had spotted the brothers on surveillance footage.