REAL BAD ACTORS
Smollett hoax co-conspirators reveal new details in doc series
Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo claim the morning they prepared to allegedly help actor Jussie Smollett stage a racist and homophobic attack against himself in 2019, he was late.
“We made sure we got there at 2 a.m. sharp. We had no phones because he did not want us to bring any phones,” Abimbola, who goes by Abel, alleged.
“So 2 a.m., he was nowhere to be found. He was not there, so we were like, ‘Damn, what do we do?’ ” he said of himself and his brother. “We didn’t have no way of contacting him. He had no way of contacting us. So we waited here for about . . . four minutes.”
Olabinjo, known as
Ola, chimed in: “But it felt like forever.”
The Osundairo brothers returned to the posh Chicago block for the first time since that chilly January 2019 morning for the five-part docuseries “Jussie Smollett: Anatomy of a Hoax,” streaming Monday on Fox Nation.
In their first extensive interview since testifying at Smollett’s trial in 2021, the brothers share “exclusive” details of their alleged roles in the real-life made-for-TV drama that captured headlines for years.
Fake noose
“As we cross the street, we said ‘Hey!’ to get his attention,” the brothers tell the camera crew in tow for the series. “‘Hey, [N-word].’ He turned around, looked at us, and that’s when we started yelling the famous slurs he wanted us to yell. ‘Hey, aren’t you that “Empire” [gay slur]?’ ”
“We started tussling, moving around, and then I pull him to the ground,” Abel says of Smollett, 40. “He wanted it to look like he fought back. That was very important for him because he said, ‘Hey, don’t just beat my ass. Make it look like I’m fighting back and whatnot.’ ”
Smollett — who has long proclaimed his innocence — didn’t participate in the project, which arrives nearly two weeks after he filed an appeal challenging his 2021 conviction of disorderly conduct and requesting a new trial.
The Post reached out to a Smollett attorney for comment.
The Fox Nation special rehashes the rise and fall of the openly gay actor, who was starring in the hit Fox drama “Empire” at the time of the incident. Abel alleges Smollett didn’t provide a specific motive, but wanted to be the “poster boy for activism.” The brothers claim Smollett walked them through the plans and accompanied them to the site beforehand.
Abel said he remarked afterward, “Yo, this Hollywood s - - t is crazy. And this dude, wow, I don’t know what the hell he’s on. But, s - - t, we’re part of it now. Now it’s time to, you know, carry on and follow through with it.”
Smollett reported being assaulted while walking back to his high-rise from a Subway restaurant. He said his attackers yelled slurs at him, declared Chicago is “MAGA country,” hit him, poured a chemical substance on him and hung a noose around his neck.
Eddie Johnson — who served as Chicago police superintendent from 2016 to 2019 — admits in the docuseries that police actually had a “better photo” of the suspects than the grainy one they initially shared, but feared inciting “angst” among Chicago’s black and gay community.
“So now, in full disclosure, I can say this: The reason why we wouldn’t let them put it out was because it did have a . . . red baseball cap,” Johnson, 62, said. The red hat was allegedly worn to suggest ties to then-President Trump’s Make America Great Again motto. “I didn’t want people to focus on that because it would cause more angst. So now, that next day, when everybody finds out about it, do you think we would have had some issues in the city? Yeah, we would have.”
Within days, police determined the men were the Osundairo brothers, small-time actors who had worked as background players on “Empire.”
The brothers eventually decided to cooperate with police, and Smollett was hit with 16 felony counts of disorderly conduct for making a false report. He was accused of orchestrating a hoax to boost his music and acting careers.
But in a shocking move, less than three weeks later, the charges were dropped by Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx’s office after Smollett performed community service and forfeited his $10,000 bond to the city of Chicago.
Foxx failure
Johnson says in the docuseries that he was at a police ceremony with then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel when he heard the surprising development.
“He was like, ‘Supe, how the f - - k did this s - - t happen?’ ” Johnson says of Emanuel’s reaction. “He said, ‘I know [Foxx] and I don’t have the best relationship, but you and her talk all the time. Did you know?’ And I said, ‘I didn’t have a clue.’ ”
The Post reached out to a rep for Emanuel, now the US ambassador to Japan, for comment.
Smollett held a brief press conference after the charges were officially dropped. Johnson accused him of “gloating,” which “reinvigorated everybody.”
“After I saw that press conference, I called the mayor. I said, ‘You know what? Game on,’ ” he said.
Foxx, 50, had recused herself from the investigation after it surfaced she had been in touch with Smollett’s family.
“In the beginning, [Foxx and I] were in lockstep with this thing,” Johnson said. “I do think, however, something occurred. Now what that something is, I really couldn’t say.”
Johnson added, “What those reasons are, I don’t think we’ll ever really know.”
A spokesperson for
Foxx told The Post, “We are unable to comment on this matter.”
Smollett was sentenced in March 2022 to 150 days in jail, but served six before he was released pending his appeal.